Lord Ashley of Stoke: asked Her Majesty's Government:
	Whether they have any plans to change the current legal definition of disability.

Lord Bramall: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that optimistic statement—or overoptimistic, as some might think. As a famous Chief of the Imperial General Staff from World War I said, "I've 'eard different". The centre was described by a Minister six and a half years ago as a key element in the regeneration of defence medical services, which another Minister openly admitted were suffering a crisis of morale. As the Minister said, it opened in 2001 boasting the title "centre of excellence". Does the Minister not find it slightly shameful, therefore, that it has never in fact properly got off the ground to correct those ills because of lack of Treasury funding?
	There are strong rumours, which the Minister may wish to comment on, that the centre is shortly to be dispersed. Will he not recognise that failing to allow the centre to live up to its promised expectations, particularly in teaching—all its specialists get whipped off to Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan—is contributing to the Government's overdependence on the National Health Service and on their continual inability to provide regulars and reservists with the full comprehensive and appropriate medical cover that they so richly deserve, including, of course, the aftercare?

Lord Lloyd of Berwick: My Lords, I wish to paint in the background of this matter as it is a long time since it was considered in Committee.
	I start with the police role in cautioning young offenders. That role was overhauled by the Government in 1998 and put on a statutory basis in the Crime and Disorder Act of that year. But we are not dealing with young offenders today so I say no more about that. The police role in cautioning adult offenders has never been put on a statutory basis but it is of very long standing. It has been regulated by successive Home Office circulars setting out the National Standards for Cautioning Offenders. I believe that the most recent was issued in 2005.
	Cautioning has always been a very valuable tool for dealing with low-level offenders. Its essential features are well known: the offender must admit his guilt and be willing to accept the caution. It has always been vital that cautioning rather than prosecuting should be in the public interest. It goes without saying that cautioning does not involve punishment.
	The simple caution was always very useful and it still is. Then in 2003 the Home Office came up with an idea that cautioning could be made even more useful in some cases. It depended on the offender being willing to make reparation for his offence and on the victim being willing to accept reparation. The idea was that the offender and the victim should be brought face to face—always if the victim was willing—and the offender would then make amends either by repairing any damage which he had done to the victim's property, paying the victim compensation or, indeed, just apologising. The evidence was that this,
	"can reduce reoffending and improve victim satisfaction with the criminal justice system".—[Official Report, 29/10/03; col. 362.]
	Those are not my words but those of the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General on Report in 2003. He referred then to this as a very exciting new idea. I agree that it was. The criminologists refer to it by the name of "restorative justice". But I do not believe that anyone ever thought that conditional cautions of that kind would be useful except in a small number of cases.
	The other condition which could be imposed, again with the consent of the offender, was that he should undergo some form of treatment. Again, it would obviously apply in only very few cases. The code explaining the purpose of conditional cautions, as contained in the 2003 Act, stated at page six:
	"Rehabilitation: this might include taking part in treatment for drug or alcohol dependency, e.g. attendance at self-help groups"
	and so on. Attendance at anger management courses is another example given.On reparation, the code says,
	"this might include repairing or otherwise making good any damage caused to property (e.g. by cleaning graffiti), restoring stolen goods, paying modest financial compensation, or in some cases a simple apology to the victim."
	That was the idea, and, if I may say so, a very good idea it was. If, during his speech in 2003, the Attorney-General had been asked, "Why do you not extend conditional cautions so as to include the possibility of imposing a fine?", he would, I believe, have answered: "But that is the very opposite of what we are trying to do. How can a fine help the victim? How can a fine rehabilitate the offender? There is nothing restorative in a fine, and there is no reason to suppose that it will reduce re-offending. If a fine is the appropriate remedy, it should be imposed in the usual way by magistrates". I do not know whether that is the answer that the Attorney-General would have given in 2003, but it is very different from his answer now. I need not say that I find his 2003 speech a great deal more persuasive and convincing than the one he made in Committee on 6 July, which I have read with the greatest care.
	I oppose Clause 16 standing part on the following grounds. First, it is wrong in principle for the prosecution to determine the level of punishment. Indeed, it is wrong for the prosecution to have any say in the sentencing process at all. Sentencing has always been for the courts, at least since the Bill of Rights of 1689. No amount of Home Office guidance on how this proposed fine should be made a condition, and no amount of safeguards that could be built into the Bill at this or any stage, can get away from that basic objection.
	The point can be illustrated from a very different field: the mandatory life sentence for murder. Traditionally, the Home Secretary justified his claim to have the last word on when a prisoner should be released on the ground that he was not exercising a sentencing function at all but he was only determining when the prisoner should be released. That fallacy was exposed finally and firmly by the House of Lords in Anderson, of which I am sure the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General will be well aware. At the other end of the scale, in support of this provision, reliance is sometimes placed on the fixed penalty for parking illegally or for not wearing a seat belt. But fixed penalties are entirely different. The amount is fixed by statute or by-law; it does not in any way involve the prosecution's discretion.
	My first objection being the straightforward objection on the grounds of principle, my second is that the existing conditions under the 2003 Act are entirely consistent with the basic concept of a caution. Punishment, however, is entirely inconsistent with that basic concept. Indeed, the notion of a punitive caution could almost be said to be a contradiction in terms.
	When the Government say in their various documents that they are only extending conditional cautions, widening their scope or filling a gap, it sounds harmless enough. But it is not harmless, because Clause 16 does much more: it creates something "radically new". Those are not my words, but those of Hazel Blears in Committee in the other place, where she said that this new concept could affect as many as 30,000 individuals a year. My objection is that the two ideas, a caution and punishment, are inconsistent with each other.
	Thirdly, I fear that if fines are capable of being made conditions, they will soon in practice replace the other conditions, because they are much easier to monitor and enforce. If that happens, all the good done by the 2003 Act, and which should continue, might be driven out by the bad done by the 2006 Act.
	Fourthly, if we are introducing something "radically new", as Hazel Blears said—and I certainly believe that—should we not have had proper consultation before we were asked to do that? The noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General has expressed regret that there was not more consultation, but he says that he and the Lord Chancellor discussed the matter with judges, magistrates and officials—although I do not know who they may be. I, too, have discussed the matter with judges and magistrates and I found no one in favour of this proposal—certainly not the magistrates, judging from their views expressed as recently as March 2006; nor do I read Lord Justice Auld in his 2001 report as favouring what is now proposed. In its recent paper, Liberty made a strong case against the proposal.
	Lastly, there is surely an overwhelming case for waiting until the results of the 2003 experiment are available, so that we can know whether it is working. What is the urgency? The answer, we are told, is the pressure on magistrates' courts and the need to divert 30,000 cases at whatever cost in terms of constitutional principle. Conditional cautions under the 2003 Act were progressive, beneficial and based on principle. The current proposal is not. It is yet another example of expediency driving out principle, and I hope that we shall oppose it. I beg to move.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, I have added my name in support of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick. During our debates in Committee in July on conditional cautions, I made it clear that we continued strongly to support the provisions launched by the Criminal Justice Act 2003. That, as the noble and learned Lord pointed out, introduced conditional cautions intended to facilitate rehabilitation of offenders or ensure that they made reparation for the offences. But now the Government wish to impose conditional cautions as a punitive measure.
	My colleague, Nick Herbert, expressed our concerns during the debates in another place about the extension of cautions to punishment, but at that time, in spring this year, we said that we would not oppose the clause remaining in the Bill while we assessed the impact of the new proposals on cautioning. I put on record in Committee our concern about developments in government policy since the clause was debated in another place. This summer, the Prime Minister has announced that he intends dramatically to increase the use of administrative punishment and avoid using the courts.
	We are deeply concerned that the Government are taking our judicial system down a route that may be convenient to them but that certainly has not been proved to serve the victim and the public well. As the noble and learned Lord made clear, there has as yet been no proper public debate on this matter. He put forward strong arguments for removing this clause.
	The Minister is of course aware of the concerns expressed about these measures by the Magistrates' Association, for one, which I thank for its courtesy in coming to the House during the Recess to provide me with further briefing on its views on the matter. The association remains obdurate against the inclusion of the clause.
	Fair trial safeguards and the involvement of the independent court in the delivery of punishment are also in the wider public interest and in the interest of victims of crime. The rigours of an open trial help to ensure that the right person is convicted and demonstrate publicly that justice is being done and that the state will not accept criminal behaviour. An open trial provides a public warning against offending. A publicly observed objective process in the criminal justice system can also be of great value for victims. I do not see how punitive cautions would deliver those additional benefits.
	If we were to remove this clause today, we would keep to the current legal position on conditional cautions. The system has not yet been running long enough to prove its own merits or demerits, but we certainly hope that it will prove to have merits. Indeed, in Committee, when I asked the noble and learned Lord the Attorney-General about the reoffending rate for those who have accepted conditional cautions, he said that,
	"the scheme has been going for an insufficient length of time to give a meaningful answer to that question".—[Official Report, 6/7/06; col. 378.]
	He also said that, if he could improve on that answer, he would write to me, and I am grateful to him for so doing at the end of last week. However, as he will know, my gratitude has to be somewhat tempered by the fact that his letter basically said: "I've got nothing more to tell you. There isn't sufficient information to give a robust interpretation of the impact of the 2003 measures". I have the letter in front of me and I give a précis of it, but the noble and learned Lord, while trying to be helpful, was not able to provide robust information to persuade me that the original cautions are working in the way that we hope.
	It seems only sensible that, before further changing the law on conditional cautions, we should wait to see how the current law has operated in practice across England and Wales. After all, as the noble and learned Lord said, when Hazel Blears introduced these matters in another place she acknowledged that they were an "innovative and radical departure" from the current law. That was way back in the spring—on the morning of 23 March, at col. 167. I have nothing against innovation, radical or whatever; if it is done for the right reasons, I would welcome it. But the Government have not yet proved their case on Clause 16, particularly in the light of the policies that they have headlined over the summer. They have themselves accepted that this is a significant matter that requires wider public discussion and consultation. I noticed that the DCA's paper Delivering Simple, Speedy, Summary Justice, which was published in July this year, says at paragraph 7.7 on page 40, that,
	"we need to engage with the judiciary, criminal justice practitioners, communities and the public in general about where the balance lies between simple and immediate responses to low level misbehaviour and fast, efficient and modern court processes".
	I would certainly agree with such a consultation, but the wider debate called for in the DCA's paper has not yet taken place. If we truly value accountability to the public and the victim, that consultation should proceed before we plunge in and include the clause.

Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: My Lords, I support the amendment. The extension of conditional cautions beyond reparation and rehabilitation to include wider punitive conditions is highly undesirable, as we have heard expressed so eloquently by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd. We entirely endorse the current principle of conditional cautions, which is that the only conditions that may be applied are those that will facilitate the rehabilitation of the offender or ensure that he or she makes reparation for the offence.
	That underlines the very important principle that cautions are meant to be an alternative to entering the criminal justice process, and it is also a means of encouraging the person not to reoffend while still at the lowest level of offending. Indeed, I believe that reparation and rehabilitation constitute constructive punishment. Making good damage to a person's property or being required to attend a rehab clinic, for example, is much tougher than simply paying a fine, which allows the offender to walk away from the reality of what he has done.
	Every means of keeping people out of the criminal justice system is to be encouraged, particularly where younger people are concerned. Never has this been truer than it is today, when people are criminalised earlier and earlier compared with 10 years ago, as is well documented. That has, in turn, contributed to the catastrophic situation in our prisons today, which is due in large part to the slippery slope on which petty offenders find themselves at an early stage and to the Government's misguided belief that prison is the only way to be tough rather than their recognising the failure that it largely is. It is important that we find ways of diverting people from offending at the earliest possible stage, which is why the conditional caution is such a constructive tool in the process.
	However, as we have already heard, the extension of conditional cautions to include wider punitive conditions is another matter entirely. This clause allows inclusion of specifically punitive conditions, which at the moment might include a fine of up to £500 or a community-based order of up to 20 hours, described, as has already been heard, by Hazel Blears as an innovative and radical departure affecting up to 30,000 people a year.
	We have already voiced our concerns in this place about this extension of administrative justice to punishments imposed by the police and prosecutors rather than the courts because we believe in a principle of justice that sentencing and punishment should be imposed by an entirely independent tribunal and not a biased prosecutorial authority. There is a real risk that these proposals could be seen as allowing the police and the CPS to act as investigators, prosecutors and judges. In addition, there is a further risk that the powers could be used to deal with high-level offending. My concern is how the proposals could affect younger people or those with special needs, who are very unlikely to understand or fully appreciate the implications of what is being offered and will have little idea of where to go for legal advice. Such people are, by definition, vulnerable, and a fear of prosecution and, in particular, the idea of having to go to court is enough for them to agree to anything, whether they are guilty of anything or not.
	Any extension of more punitive conditions not only has alarming implications for the extension of administrative justice in this country but it also runs a risk of tipping vulnerable people into the criminal justice system. I feel that that is an unacceptable price to pay for simple, speedy, summary justice. It is not only potentially hazardous so far as concerns the life chances of such petty offenders but it has serious implications for the management of the criminal justice system as a large number of people are likely to be sucked into it. They, society as a whole and our system of justice risk being damaged by it.
	We entirely endorse the Government's policy to make reparation and rehabilitation a central feature of policy, and it seems to us that the current legal position on conditional cautions is a creative way of embedding it. We support the amendment and the retention of the current position on conditional cautions.

Lord Goldsmith: My Lords, this group includes government Amendment No. 145, and I shall speak to that as well as responding to the speeches on whether the clause shall stand part. I shall do that first as, in part, it responds to at least one of the points made by the noble Baroness.
	A concern touched on in Amendment No. 65, which was not moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, relates to the financial limit that is set out in the Bill and how that might be changed. I detected agreement between us on two points: first, that this policy—certainly this is the Government's intention—is not intended to deal with high-level offending but with low-level offending and, therefore, it is right that there should be a financial limit; but, secondly, it was also acknowledged that financial limits, when set in primary legislation, need to have a mechanism for adjusting them. We responded to the concerns expressed about how that adjustment should take place by recognising that it would be appropriate to have as an additional safeguard for a change in the financial limit that no change should be made save by order subject to affirmative resolution.
	Amendment No. 145, to which I now speak, seeks to ensure that any changes to time or financial limits on punitive conditions are subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. Therefore, it would require, as is obvious, any changes to those limits to be subject to a vote in both Houses of Parliament. That applies to the financial penalty and to the number of hours that an offender could be required to attend. I shall move that amendment formally when it is called.
	I turn to the substance, which is the conditional cautioning scheme. I recognise, with appreciation, the support that has been expressed in all three speeches for the concept that we tried to introduce and have introduced in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. We believe that it was not enough to have simply a stark choice between a caution, which amounts to saying, "Don't do it again", and an appearance in court, with all that that entails and with a penalty attached to it. We wanted to find ways to deal with low-level crime fast and effectively that would meet the needs of everyone, including the needs of victims when they are present. I believe the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, reads too much into what was said previously to say that this was all about victims. Certainly, a face-to-face meeting with victims is one way of dealing with a disposal, but it is certainly not the most usual way of dealing with a disposal. It certainly is not the most usual way of dealing with conditional cautions.
	We also wanted to find quick and effective ways of dealing with the offending behaviour of the individual. The noble and learned Lord spoke about the rehabilitative condition, saying that he thought that that would apply to only a very few people. I beg to differ with him. The number of people in this country who commit relatively low-level crime as a result of problems with drugs, with drink and with other issues of that sort, such as anger problems, is quite high. One only needs to visit a magistrates' court any day of the week or, even more so, to visit a police station to see how often those issues arise.
	However, once the scheme started to operate, it became apparent to those who were operating it that there were certain limitations in the scheme. The experience of operating it has been positive, but there are limitations in the cases where it can be used. I shall give one or two examples of that in a moment, as I tried to do in Committee when we dealt with clause stand part.
	The noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, and the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, spoke of the time that we have had. There has not been enough time to reach any conclusions on the reoffending rate, but the scheme has been operating in parts of the country sufficiently to know that it is well worthwhile—I have had that directly from those operating it, who have also reported to me what the victims involved have said—and that there are limitations in how it works. I do not want to focus on the financial penalty first, but on the other condition referred to: the number of hours worked, which is looked at rather clinically. I shall give a good example, although this is not how it might operate exclusively.
	You could come across an offender who has been spraying graffiti around the town. If you can identify the particular place that that offender has been spraying graffiti, you can invite him to agree that, instead of going to court, he will clean it off under the current scheme. That is reparative, because it relates to the specific graffiti he dealt with. Noble Lords might think that a good way of bringing the consequences of his behaviour home to the offender—"If you go around spraying graffiti, somebody must clean it off and you will be that person on this occasion"—and help with his future behaviour.
	However, if there is an instance where the graffiti for which he was responsible cannot be identified, although you know that he was the offender and he admits that he was, or it has already been cleaned off by the wall's owner, you cannot say "We want you to clean graffiti off another wall instead". In our view, that is not possible under the Bill because it is not actually repairing the specific damage he did. In terms of the benefit to him of seeing the effect of his offending behaviour, I believe that that would be an appropriate and proper response, although noble Lords may disagree. However, we could not do that without making the amendment.

Lord Goldsmith: My Lords, I am absolutely not going to shy away from that, and will come to it. It may be at the heart of the issue rather more than the point of work. It is important that noble Lords understand—which is why I take the liberty of explaining it—that the removal of this clause does not just deal with the fine element, but the sort of example I have given: that you cannot ask someone to clear up a piece of graffiti without being clear that he is responsible for it.
	Where somebody has been drunk and disorderly, causing a nuisance in the community—goodness knows, I am afraid that happens a great deal—one might think that to say, "Right, you should help clear up the street on a Sunday morning, perhaps the street littered with beer cans from the night before", would be an appropriate response. It would be a good way of bringing his offending behaviour home to him, and a good thing for the community. You cannot impose that under the current conditions. Nor can magistrates impose it, because they have a lower limit of 40 hours for community service, and cannot impose it unless it is of a sufficient degree of seriousness, which this would not be. We are missing a whole range of response.
	I shall give an example of where the fine is appropriate. We currently have a system under which fixed-penalty notices can be imposed by the police not just for driving offences or the sort of thing the noble and learned Lord referred to, but also, under schemes approved by Parliament, for things like drunkenness and public disorder offences. Let us take the example of someone who, on a Saturday night or whenever, drinks too much, comes out of the pub and starts with very bad behaviour. If he kicks in a door, you can invite him to repair the door if the owner of that property wants him to. Some owners of property will say, "We don't want that person repairing our door. We don't want him anywhere near our house". You can suggest to him that he should go on a course to deal with his alcohol or attend self-help groups to deal with anger management. The police could impose a fine without going to court at all. It is important to recognise that, and, contrary to what the noble and learned Lord says, they have discretion—not on the amount, I accept—whether to impose a fine. What you cannot do at the moment is to say, "What this really needs is your agreement to deal with your problem by going on some sort of course, but you also need to recognise the wrongness of your behaviour by paying a relatively modest financial penalty". You cannot at the moment do both.
	The prosecution could give a conditional caution to deal with alcohol management or anger management and the police could impose a penalty. Both those things could happen outside court, but you cannot do both. This provision would enable both to be done.
	What are the safeguards? This is important because the first point raised by the noble Lord was a constitutional concern that punishment should be imposed by the courts. I am a little surprised that no noble Lord who has spoken has referred to the fact that this is not an imposition at all. It remains for the courts because no offender will be required to accept a conditional caution. It cannot be imposed on him against his will. He will have free legal advice on whether to accept the condition. If he does not accept the condition, he can simply say, "I will go to court. I will plead not guilty in court", or, "I will plead guilty in court and I would rather have the court deal with it". It is not a case of giving the prosecutors the power to punish because it is for the court ultimately to do that. A condition is being offered which differs from fixed penalties, which are a punishment imposed not by the prosecutor but by the police. I give way to the noble and learned Lord.

Lord Goldsmith: My Lords, the noble and learned Lord will perhaps not be surprised to hear that I do not disagree with him about not having arm twisting. That is why the safeguards are important. Let me enumerate them. The first and most important is that nothing can actually be imposed. The offender does not have to admit his guilt. He can go to court. He does not have to accept the condition. He can go to court and leave it to the court to decide. But there are further conditions. This does not apply unless the proposed response is appropriate and proportionate. That is in guidance.
	Secondly, the offences for which the conditional caution could be given are limited by guidance, not from the Home Office but from the Director of Public Prosecutions and approved by the Attorney-General. That will not just cover which offences are considered, it will also control the way the scheme is operated. A detailed matrix will be developed following consultation that will set out which offences could be considered for a financial penalty condition and provide guidance on the level of that penalty, again to be approved by the director and me.
	Thirdly, before the condition can be proposed, there must be sufficient evidence to prosecute. The prosecutor needs to be satisfied about that. The noble and learned Lord and others will see the distinction, for example, from a fixed-penalty notice for drunkenness which does not involve a prosecutor being satisfied on the evidence; a police officer could just impose it. The House might think it would be better to have the involvement of the independent prosecutor.
	Fourthly, one of the key tests to be applied to the decision to offer a conditional caution will be whether it is in the public interest to divert the offender from prosecution. That is clear in the Code for Crown Prosecutors. It identifies cases for a conditional caution as follows:
	"while the public interest justifies a prosecution, the interests of the suspect, victim and community may be better served by the suspect complying with suitable conditions".
	Fifthly—I mention this point previously and it directly relates to the concerns expressed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell of Markyate—free legal advice will be available. As I said in 2003, that may be telephone legal advice, but legal advice will still be available to someone as to what is the effect of a condition, whether to accept it and whether that is the right thing to do.
	As I said, the conditions must be proportionate to the offence; they must be suitable to the offender; and they must be achievable. I hope that I gave reassurance previously that they would take into account the means of the offender, for example. That will be clearly set out. The offender has to admit his guilt before a condition can be agreed. There is no sanction for breach of a conditional caution. If the offender does not meet the condition, he gets taken to court, not for breach of the condition but for the original offence.

Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville: My Lords, Amendments Nos. 68, 70 and 73, which complete the selection initiated by my noble friend Lord Bridgeman, seek to apply the requirements of Clause 18 for local authorities to set up oversight and scrutiny committees for crime and disorder matters and what we have learnt to call the "community call for action" to the particular circumstances of the City of London.
	It will be no surprise to your Lordships to learn that specific provision is needed. "Unique" is an overused description; I know, however, from having had the honour to represent the City for 24 years before entering your Lordships' House—which made me the third longest serving MP for the City since 1283—that the City can genuinely be described as a class of one. I am conscious that your Lordships' House is anxious to proceed to more contentious matters, but the uniqueness of the City of London, in more senses than one, confers certain complications, which I need to explain and hope to resolve.
	I do not presume to offer your Lordships a magnum opus on the City's constitution, but it is worth recording that the City is a corporation by prescription and not a creation of Parliament. Within the City of London, one of the three executives of the City Corporation, namely the Common Council, has, however, been given the functions conferred elsewhere on the statutory local authorities since their creation as part of the 19th century reforms for local government. It is appropriate to mention, because it has particular relevance to the need for these amendments, that the City's internal structure bears little relation to that of a local authority. It is also worth noting, bearing in mind that the subject matter is crime and disorder, that the City itself incorporates the functions of a police authority.
	These features are important because when what is now Clause 18 was inserted in Committee in another place to capture councils not operating the new style executive arrangements, with which those of your Lordships with experience of local government will be familiar, the then Police Minister, Ms Hazel Blears, noted that the clause was intended to be all-encompassing as an alternative to seeking,
	"lengthy drafting amendments to the Bill".—[Official Report, Commons Standing Committee D, 23/3/06; col. 204.]
	Inherent in the intention appears to have been the assumption that the local authorities to which the clause was to apply would have an overview and scrutiny committee which the clause would complement. That was a reasonable assumption for local authorities in general because even where a local authority has not adopted the new executive arrangements, which most are required to do under the Local Government Act 2000, regulations still require those authorities to establish an overview and scrutiny committee.
	That is not, however, the case for the City of London. Unlike local authorities, the City does not have an oversight and scrutiny committee. Oversight and scrutiny functions are applied by the Common Council itself, and through its committees and sub-committees. There is therefore no existing structure to which the requirement in Clause 18 can relate. A practical consequence of applying the clause would be to require the City to reform its existing committee structure and its membership. It would require the creation of another committee to scrutinise crime and disorder matters, which are overseen also by several other committees, including the committee overseeing the police functions. It would result in confusion and duplication of functions between committees, and would certainly not enhance the efficiency of oversight and scrutiny of crime and disorder issues.
	As for the detail, I shall concentrate on Amendment No. 73. Amendment No. 68 to Clause 18 and Amendment No. 70 to Schedule 6 are consequential. The object of Amendment No. 73 is to achieve the scrutiny and accountability requirements anticipated by Clause 18, without requiring the creation of additional, unhelpful administrative machinery.
	Subsection (1) would confer on the Common Council the powers of oversight and scrutiny conferred by Clause 18(1), but without requiring the City to set up a new committee. These powers would be exercised through the Common Council's existing administrative structure. Subsections (2) and (4) would apply the requirements of transparency contained in Clause 18(2) and (7).
	Subsection (3) would apply the requirements of Clause 18(3) in respect of members of local authorities to the members of the Common Council. Subsection (5) would impose the same obligations for follow-up action on crime and disorder matters as those imposed by Clause 18(8).
	Subsection (6) applies the provisions of Clause 19, dealing with guidance and regulations issued by the Secretary of State, but subject to any modifications necessary to deal with the City's administrative structure. Subsections (7) and (8) set out the definitions.
	The new clause admittedly extends the text of the Bill by a few lines, but the need to provide for the City's particular circumstances is not unusual. It is perhaps worth noting that, in relation to oversight and scrutiny in health service matters, specific provision was made to deal with the City through Section 10 of the Health and Social Care Act 2001.
	I understand that these amendments have emerged following productive discussions between the City and Home Office officials, which I take this opportunity to acknowledge. I hope that the Minister will feel the amendments to be a reasonable way to approach the application of Clause 18 to the City.

Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, there are two distinct sets of amendments here, which I shall deal with in turn. I turn first to the amendment moved by the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, with his customary courtesy. I know that he will not be terribly happy with my response, but I trust that he will not take it as a slight—it is certainly not intended as a slight in any sense on county councils or their network.
	The purpose of the community call for action is to enable a person to raise community safety issues of local concern with local councillors. In a two-tier area, this simply should be a district councillor responsibility. My view today is the same as it was in Committee; that is, to do otherwise would lead to public confusion, as a person could raise their concerns with county and district councillors.
	It needs to be recorded that the community call for action is designed to enable the public to engage with local issues of an essentially operational nature. These issues are best handled at the district level. To extend the definition of "local authority" for the purposes of this legislation to include county councils could also bring strategic issues within the ambit of the community call for action, which has never been our intention—nor is it the intention of the draft legislation.
	Of course, that does not rule out county council involvement. County councils will have a very important role. If the issue raised by the community call for action relates to matters within the sphere of the county council, it would be reasonable and proper to expect the district councillor to whom the matter was referred to discuss the issue with the local county councillor or the county council itself. Furthermore, I would also expect a county councillor to be co-opted on to the district council overview and scrutiny committee so that their views of county councillors can be fully taken into consideration in any committee report.
	Given the assurance that the county council voice will have the scope to be heard, I hope that the noble Viscount will feel able to withdraw his amendment. County councils will be well looked after in these arrangements and their constructive role will be brought within the ambit through the route that I described.
	I now turn to the issues quite properly raised by the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville. I have good news for him, because not only do I fully appreciate the points that he made about the committee structure that already exists in the City of London, but it is certainly not the Government's intention to require the corporation to create a new scrutiny committee that cuts across existing arrangements. We are more than happy to accept these amendments, in principle.
	The important point is that the crime and disorder reduction partnership in the City should be subject to appropriate scrutiny as with such partnerships elsewhere, and that there is an appropriate committee that can consider the community call for action. I am sure that the noble Lord will appreciate that. It is not an expression of arrogance on our part, but we would like to offer our own draft of the noble Lord's amendments and get the parliamentary draftsmen to look at the drafting of a suitable amendment. If the noble Lord is happy not to press his amendments to a Division—he has already conceded that they are defective in part—we will happily bring forward our own at Third Reading and perhaps even table them jointly with the noble Lord.
	So I can offer some comfort to the noble Viscount and a great deal more comfort to the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville.

Lord Harris of Haringey: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 69 I wish to speak also to Amendments Nos. 71, 72 and 74. If passed, they would have the effect of deleting Clauses 18, 19, 20 and 21. While that might seem like radical surgery to the Bill, it is proposed with the intention of being entirely helpful to the Government.
	In your Lordships' House we all know that the Home Office is in the vanguard of progressive government thinking and that the way in which government operate is totally seamless, that different government departments talk to each other and that proposals emerge having been considered by all the relevant parts of government and parts of the government machine. That is the normal process, but I have the suspicion that on this occasion that process was perhaps not as perfect as would normally be the case and that the vanguardism of the Home Office has gone away at a slight tangent from some of the other thinking that I understand is going in the Government.
	We have been waiting for some while for a White Paper on the future of local government, and it may have been that we would have had that White Paper in advance of our detailed consideration of these clauses if things had gone according to plan. However, that has not yet happened, although one understands that the White Paper is imminent. I am told that drafts of it may exist and may shortly be considered by the Cabinet.
	Perhaps we are being slightly premature in bringing forward changes in the way crime and disorder reduction partnerships, scrutiny committees and co-options work, in advance of knowing with clarity what the Government will be proposing more generally for the future of local government. For example, we have just heard some points being raised about the position of county councils and the Corporation of London. It may be that those matters are dealt with effectively as part of the forthcoming White Paper.
	I assume—because it would be very surprising if a White Paper on the future of local government did not consider such matters—that we will be looking at the function and role of the local elected representative. Implicit in these clauses is the new community call for action. I think this could be a useful step forward, in terms of giving a new explicit role to local councillors as advocates for their local communities, working with communities to move along public services.
	If that is to be the case, however, and if the stories that are emanating about what may or may not be in the White Paper are true and similar community calls for action are to apply to other aspects of public services, we need to see whether the arrangements proposed in this Bill for the way crime and disorder matters will be treated can be read across effectively into the other areas of public services that might be affected by similar powers. Perhaps the Government are being premature. It may be that in a week's time the Minister will be able to stand up and tell us what will be in the local government White Paper, but my understanding is that it is unlikely that will happen in the next few days.
	Given that the purpose of the White Paper, we are told, is that there may be substantial legislation on the future of local government and its precise internal arrangements in the next Parliamentary Session—although obviously we cannot prejudge what might be in the Queen's Speech—it would surely be sensible to round up all these provisions as part of that at the same time. For example, there are some provisions in these clauses for co-options, and apparently there will be regulations to specify what those might be. At various times noises have emerged from the Home Office suggesting that police authorities should have a co-opted place on overview and scrutiny committees dealing with crime and disorder matters in the various local authorities in their area. Passing over for a moment the workload implications of that for police authority members, you then have to consider the relative status of a co-opted member of a police authority—or, for that matter, a co-opted county councillor sitting on a district council overview and scrutiny committee. What will be the relative status of those individuals compared with the sitting members of that principal council's role in terms of overview and scrutiny? Are you not diluting the representative, community advocacy role that we understand the Government want to create as part of the local government White Paper?
	Those matters have to be thought through very carefully. No doubt there are officials in government departments who have had towels around their heads and considered all these matters, and are coming forward with proposals of an intellectual clarity and brilliance that we will all wonder at when we hear them. In advance of seeing those proposals, however, it seems strange to set up a process that involves unspecified co-options with unspecified status. It is unclear where they will fit in.
	We have here some convoluted, rather obtuse wording that does not work well. It is trying to fit square pegs into round holes, and they do not really fit. It is hard to see how the clauses will operate. There will clearly have to be reams of regulations afterwards to try and turn them into something that will work at an operational level. In the interests of trying to help the Government out and avoid a situation where we legislate in the next Session to unpick bits of this Bill because the prevailing thinking on local government has moved on in that time, would it not be better for the Government to wrap all this up together, to think again and not to press these clauses at this time? I beg to move.

Baroness Harris of Richmond: My Lords, the proposals coming out of the CDA review, as encapsulated by this Bill, are looking, as the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, has so eloquently put it, more unworkable and more and more resource intensive. The wording on how CDRPs will function is just plain confusing. It tries to articulate a split between the levels of the CDRP that will set strategy and the levels that will deliver on this strategy. But because of the reluctance of the Government to commit anything to primary legislation, in the name of flexibility, this has been left so vague it is obtuse.
	The Community Call for Action is intended to be a mechanism of last resort, but how can we be sure that it will not be a mechanism of first resort unless safeguards against this are placed in primary legislation? And if not there, then how are safeguards to be managed and guaranteed? How do we know that overview and scrutiny committees will not be overwhelmed by matters referred to them, whether genuine or motivated by political skulduggery, extremist agendas, single issue obsessions or just plain nuisance value? How will these committees be trained, resourced and supported if there are to be many hundreds of them at district level as is proposed? Who pays—and does this represent value for money?
	Police authorities will also have a particular problem, as the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has pointed out. Most consist of only 17 members, but they must find members to sit on all the strategic level CDRPs in their area and different members to sit on all the overview and scrutiny committees that will link to the CDRPs in their area. A case study that the Association of Police Authorities has supplied to me illustrates what would happen in Surrey. It states:
	"There are currently 11 CDRPs in the county area discharging funds of approximately £2.5m. If the proposals for a strategic/operational split are taken forward each partnership would be overseen by a group at member level, whilst operational delivery would continue through groups similar to [those] currently in existence. The result would be to introduce an additional 11 groups to the structure of governance for community safety in the county.
	There is also a recommendation that these bodies co-operate at a county level to ensure that the relevant LAA targets are delivered. It is therefore likely that at least one further group will be introduced to provide that co-ordinating role.
	Each local authority would then have an oversight and scrutiny committee responsible for community safety. In the case of Surrey there would therefore be 12 such committees. The county council already has a dedicated oversight and scrutiny committee, but at district level most currently operate only loose scrutiny arrangements that would require new structures to meet the requirements of the review. As a result a further 11 groups would be introduced to oversee community safety in the county.
	These committees would be responsible for considering applications under the 'Community Call for Action' provisions and, if necessary, triggering action. When considering applications the committee would be obliged to involve representatives from each of the responsible authorities.
	The majority of funding to support community safety within the county is provided through the individual agencies, each having their own governance structure. The police are accountable through the chief constable to the police authority for their contribution. Local authorities are accountable through the portfolio holder to the Executive and to the full council for their contributions. Similar arrangements are in place for all other partners.
	Furthermore, a number of issues being addressed by the CDRPs, e.g. domestic violence, require input from other partners in the wider criminal justice system and third sector requiring different governance and accountability arrangements".
	Police authorities must have a seat on these committees if police accountability in delivering the community safety strategy is to be meaningful. It would seem to leave room for a lead role for local authorities in setting community safety strategies. On the surface, that seems like a noble and democratic aim, but it is likely to erode the accountability of the police to police authorities, and that would not be helpful. Local councils and local councillors have a vitally important role to play as advocates and voices for their communities, but that leaves room for confused accountabilities, with BCU commanders pulled in many directions by many different interests. On top of all this confusion, as the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has reminded us, a White Paper is shortly to come out dealing with reforming local authorities; yet the provisions of this part of the Bill are substantially about local authorities. We really do need to wait and see what the White Paper has to say on this, or we will be back amending this Bill by the time the ink is barely dry on its cover.

Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I have listened with some care to the comments that have been made in your Lordships' House this afternoon, and I shall attempt to reflect on those as the Bill proceeds. I was amused to be described by extension as a vanguardista by the noble Lord, Lord Harris. It is well past my student years since that description was bandied around in a rather heated debate about something that seemed terribly important at the time. I appreciate the spirit in which the noble Lord approached his amendment. Some important points have emerged in the debate, but in the end I return to the position that we as a Government would find the amendment pretty much impossible to accept, although some of the issues raised are clearly very important.
	It is worth saying that the partnership landscape, which noble Lords have discussed at several points during debates on this Bill, has moved on and changed substantially since the crime and disorder reduction partnerships, which are also known as community safety partnerships in some parts of the country, were officially created in 1998 by the Crime and Disorder Act. There is common agreement that they have played an important part in helping to achieve significant reductions in crime across England and Wales. We need to build on that success story by ensuring that the partnerships are as effective as they can be in reducing crime—there is a commonality of view that that is right—and in particular in dealing with crime and disorder, misuse of drugs, alcohol and other substances and anti-social behaviour. We have moved on, and there is much more of a consensus around those issues.
	It is common knowledge too that the Home Office undertook a review of the partnership provisions of the 1998 Act in collaboration with key stakeholders, including ACPO, the Association of Police Authorities, and the Local Government Association. The findings of that review informed the provisions in the Bill which these amendments now seek to remove. The provisions in the Bill will ensure that key tools and good practice examples, such as effective information-sharing and intelligence-led interventions, are used to optimum effect by all partners. The provisions in the Bill allow for the Secretary of State to issue regulations to define how these proposals will be implemented by the crime and disorder reduction partnerships. The provisions are there to provide the flexibility to which the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, referred.
	I understand some of the concerns raised by my noble friend about the implementation of some of these measures and I heard his ironic comments about the apparent seamlessness of Whitehall and, in particular, the role of the Home Office. I know that he would like to have seen some of the proposals as set out in the Crime and Disorder Act review made in primary legislation. For good reasons, we think that the detail should be left to regulation and guidance, and that will provide us with an opportunity to reflect further and to have more discussions and debate.
	We do not underestimate the importance of ensuring that any such secondary legislation is fully informed by practitioner expertise and the involvement of partners. For that reason, we have gone out of our way to conduct extensive consultations on the detail, with more than 1,000 practitioners across England and Wales, and we will continue to work with stakeholders as we develop the proposals for implementation.
	The amendment seeks to remove wholesale the provisions aimed at improving accountability arrangements for local community safety bodies by extending the remit of overview and scrutiny committees, requiring them to review and scrutinise the functions of crime and disorder reduction partnerships. These provisions also provide for the introduction of the community call for action. This will enable local communities to seek answers from the police, local authorities and their partners where they have failed to deal effectively with a community safety problem in their area. The provisions also give ward councillors new powers and duties to act on behalf of their communities to seek a resolution to those problems. This package of measures gives communities an opportunity to have both a voice and a role in community safety.
	A number of councils have already undertaken reviews of crime and disorder which have changed the way that services are delivered, with tangible benefits for local people. Overview and scrutiny committees are in a strong position to tackle complex and cross-cutting issues and support partnership working as well as to assist in driving up performance. We want this approach to become standard practice for community safety.
	Together these provisions form a package of measures that will enable crime and disorder reduction partnerships to continue to deliver positive community safety outcomes as well as become more visible and answerable to local communities and local politicians, who are well placed to ensure that they are well served. We reject the noble Lord's amendments for those reasons.
	These measures have not been put together in isolation. We are fully cognisant of developments in other parts of Government. We have been working closely with the Department for Communities and Local Government in implementing Crime and Disorder Act review measures, and the White Paper will complement that work. Rather than stall an important process that needs momentum and development, it is important to put in place, at least in outline, measures that will strengthen crime and disorder reduction partnerships and take forward work which has been widely acknowledged successful. I understand the concerns raised by the noble Baroness and the noble Lord. Discussions can continue on those issues, but I urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendments.

Lord Drayson: My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall now repeat a Statement made in another place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence. The Statement is as follows:
	"With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a Statement about our operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "I should like to start by expressing my deepest condolences to the families and friends of the brave servicemen who have lost their lives since I last spoke to the House on 24 July. Five soldiers have died on operations in Iraq, all killed in action. Twenty-seven personnel from all three services have died in Afghanistan, 11 of them killed in action, and 16 have been lost in other incidents, including those killed in the RAF Nimrod crash on 2 September. Others have been wounded, and our thoughts should be with them also."Let me turn first to Iraq. The House will be aware of the escalation of sectarian violence in recent months, particularly in and around Baghdad. The combined Iraqi and American Baghdad security plan, which I was briefed on in Baghdad in August, just before it began, is a major initiative aimed at improving security for all the communities in the city. The security element is closely followed by co-ordinated projects to improve basic services, backed by $400 million of funding. In those areas that have so far been cleared of terrorists and sectarian gangs, with 1,700 weapons seized, citizens are reporting better security and are starting to see improvements in their daily lives."That said, however, the overall level of violence across the city, including sectarian killings, remains unacceptable. There was further evidence of this today. But the plan is still in its early stages and there is impressive commitment from American, coalition and Iraqi forces. "In the UK's area of operation in south-east Iraq, the biggest challenges lie in Basra city. Two weeks ago, Iraqi and UK forces began a large-scale operation moving through the city sector by sector, strengthening security and improving basic services. One important element of the operation is a renewed effort to improve the capacity of the Iraqi police and to address infiltration by militias. The operation also includes clean-up projects, agriculture projects and projects to improve basic services, including bringing clean drinking water to a part of the city which has never had it before."Elsewhere in the south-east, in September Dhi Qar became the second province to be handed over to the Iraqi authorities, following Al Muthanna in July. We should congratulate the Iraqis on this achievement and also our international partners."In terms of future planning for the UK in Iraq, I can confirm that the force package for the next routine roulement in November, in which 19 Light Brigade takes over from 20 Armoured Brigade, is essentially that which I outlined in my announcement to the House on 18 July. I should also draw the House's attention to my Written Statement on 11 September, which confirmed a temporary deployment of 360 troops, including specialists such as engineers to help to deliver the Basra projects I described earlier, and elements of the Theatre Reserve Battalion to provide support during the roulement period. Excluding the temporary deployment, this will leave our force level in Iraq at approximately 7,100."We should be in no doubt that this is a decisive period in the future of Iraq. There is much debate here in Britain, in America and of course in Iraq about the best way forward. But all agree that military means alone will not be decisive. This is especially true now, when it is clear that sectarianism and the struggle for power have emerged as a major threat to Iraq's security. What is required above all is a political solution. That must include a genuine effort at national reconciliation, drawing all Iraq's communities into a political process and away from violence. Prime Minister Maliki and his Government are trying to deliver this. We and our coalition partners must do all we can to support them and strengthen their resolve—so, too, must the international community as a whole, and Iraq's near neighbours in particular."Let me now turn to Afghanistan. The achievements and losses of our forces in Helmand province rightly have been the focus of our attention in the past two months. The work our forces are doing there is difficult, dangerous and exhausting. I salute them—particularly the men and women of 16 Air Assault Brigade, who are coming home having been relieved by 3 Commando. I shall be visiting them tomorrow to thank them in person but today, on behalf of the whole House, I should like formally to record our recognition of the bravery, professionalism and sacrifice of this brigade and all those from across the three services who supported them during this tour. "On the fifth anniversary of our intervention in Afghanistan, we should reflect on the progress our efforts have brought about: 2,000 schools built; 5 million children in school, one-third of them girls; more than 70 new hospitals and clinics; 4.5 million refugees returning home. This is not a failing mission."NATO, in the shape of the ISAF force, and under the leadership of General Richards, now has responsibility for the whole of Afghanistan. But as we know, the summer has seen fierce fighting. As I made clear in a speech last month, the persistence of the Taliban was greater than we expected. Such is the nature of operations: the enemy always has a vote and we have adapted. But let me repeat, the force package we deployed, and which we have strengthened further over the summer, was designed to deal with violent resistance, and in every encounter with the Taliban our forces have defeated it. Moreover, by attacking us directly, the Taliban has taken heavy losses, both in northern Helmand and against the Canadians in Kandahar. We have sent a clear message that we will not be beaten in combat, a message not lost on the local population. This has strengthened the position of local leaders, some of whom are now pursuing peaceful negotiations with our commanders and with the Afghan Government. "In Afghanistan we have reached a key point in the campaign. On Sunday I spoke to General Richards and he described the situation as a window of opportunity. If we can build upon the blow we have delivered to the Taliban, if we can quickly deliver real, concrete changes to the lives of ordinary Afghans through development and reconstruction, then we can begin to generate the lasting support the Government need. "So we are moving forward, but consistently I have made clear the challenges we still face. The assumption of complete military command for Afghanistan is a significant achievement for NATO, but also a significant test. There are still shortfalls in the planned force structure. Caveats on the use of some forces remain. I have been in frequent, often daily discussions with the secretary-general and fellow defence ministers to reinforce the message that as an alliance we must live up to our commitment to Afghanistan, sharing the burden and the risks. I ensured this subject was top of the agenda at the NATO summit in Slovenia two weeks ago and I will continue to press for urgent action. We have made some progress; some caveats are lifting. The Poles have confirmed they will provide a battalion, and the Canadians plan to put further troops into the south. Importantly, General Richards judges he has the forces to maintain the relatively stable security situation that now exists. But I will continue to push for his requirements to be met in full as a matter of urgency. "In Helmand, the UK Task Force also faces challenges. The battles we have fought in the north of the province have brought us to the relative stability we have seen in recent weeks. Taliban activity is down, and engagement with local leaders is growing. But we must capitalise quickly with progress on reconstruction. We are rebalancing our forces, taking advantage of the steady improvement in the Afghan army and police to concentrate our forces on the central area surrounding the provincial capital Lashkar Gah. This should increase the scope for other government departments to act in safety, and should also increase the confidence of local enterprises and international NGOs to begin the reconstruction that is at the core of our strategy."Back in the UK, the main challenge for me, my department and the joint headquarters and chiefs is to give our troops the resources they need to get the job done. This is a relentless task, but we are rising to it. We have now almost completely deployed the reinforcements I described to the House on 10 July, with the last few elements due in to Afghanistan in the next few weeks. That includes: two more Chinook helicopters and more flying hours for helicopters across the fleet, more capacity to train the Afghan National Army, engineers to take forward development, and more infantry. On 24 July, I announced a new package for protected vehicles for both Afghanistan and Iraq, including 100 new Mastiff and 100 additional Vector, funded by new money from the Treasury. We continue to invest heavily in force protection, including countermeasures to protect vehicles against attack, defensive aids for aircraft and personal body armour. I believe we have shown we can be responsive to the requests of commanders and we will continue to be so."Of course, support for our troops is not just about numbers of people and equipment; it is also about pay, conditions, welfare and medical care. In all these areas we are constantly reviewing what more is needed, and for some weeks now I have specifically been looking at pay levels for forces on operations."Our forces are some of the best paid in the world. Only Canada pays more across the ranks. But forces from other countries do not pay tax when on operations, and this has led some to demand that we do the same for our people. I think we can do better."I am pleased to announce today that we intend to introduce a new, tax-free, flat-rate, operational bonus, which, for a six-month tour, would amount to £2,240. For an average private or lance corporal, this is equivalent to the amount of tax they would pay during a six-month tour. It means that half our people on operations will be better off than under a tax exemption, increasingly so for the lower paid. The most junior will be over £500 better off after a six-month tour than if we had simply exempted them from tax. As importantly, everyone on operations will be equally better off than they are now, by just under £100 per week, free of tax."I would like to thank my right honourable friend the Chancellor for making over £60 million of new money available so we can fund this new bonus, without taking any existing defence funding away from front-line needs. "This is a complex area. I have been looking at these questions for weeks, but I can assure the House that the troops who have been fighting in Afghanistan over the summer will not lose out. The payment will be backdated to 1 April 2006, as an adjustment to pay arrangements in the current financial year. Full details of eligibility will be made public shortly but I can confirm that, besides Afghanistan, it will apply to our forces in Iraq and the Balkans."Let me finally deal with the issue of medical care for those injured on operations. First, I want to challenge the notion that the current system is in any way inferior to what went before. In particular, the relentless attack on the work of the outstanding medical staff, military and civilian, at Selly Oak Hospital is unfair and misplaced. I have been there twice in recent months. It is one of the highest performing and most successful hospital trusts in the NHS and provides major specialist centres for trauma, burns, plastic surgery and neuroscience."Our primary concern is to give our injured people the best medical care available. This is to be found inside the NHS. While some have been calling in public for a return to military hospitals, we have been quietly getting on with the job of establishing a military-managed ward at Selly Oak in partnership with the NHS. I can confirm that this will be operational before the end of the year."I have been open about the nature of the challenges we face in our operational theatres. I do not seek to hide from this House the difficulties we face in overcoming them, but I am convinced our strategy remains the right one."In Afghanistan, we have to tackle the south and the east if we are to secure what has already been achieved in the rest of the country. We have to make the comprehensive approach work, with all government departments acting together to achieve our objectives. We have to get NATO to live up to its commitments."In Iraq, we have to support the Iraqi Government, their army and police in taking responsibility for their own security and holding the line against sectarian infighting. We will do all these things; we cannot afford not to."I have spoken many times about the debt we owe to the men and women who serve in our Armed Forces and who carry out this hard and dangerous work on our behalf. I am sure the House will join me in paying tribute to them again today".
	My Lords, that concludes the Statement.

Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. We on these Benches also express our condolences to the families of those troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan during this long, hot and difficult summer. Our thoughts are also with those who have been wounded, some very seriously, and their families. We also pay tribute to those servicemen and servicewomen serving now in Iraq and Afghanistan, those who have served there and those who will be taking their turn for a tour of duty. It is vital that we do everything possible to look after the families of those on active service.
	My immediate personal reaction to the wording of the Statement is that it is complacent to the point of being misleading and that it further discloses an inability by the Government to grasp what needs to be done, what should have been done and what must be done now. There is a growing sense that Ministers, in their public utterances, are living in an unreal world, quite different from that in which our troops on the ground are fighting and being killed.
	In Afghanistan, we now find ourselves with a conflict out of all proportion to that promised by Ministers. Troops have been engaged in the hardest sustained fighting since the Second World War with a steady stream of casualties sustained in close-quarter battle, with many instances of real heroism. In these circumstances, our servicemen and servicewomen have a right to expect only the best treatment before, during and after combat.
	It is the job of a responsible Opposition to scrutinise the Government's conduct of these operations. We owe that to the soldiers out there. While we have always supported the Government's aims—it is essential that we do not allow either country to become a breeding ground for terrorism—we have always held and expressed reservations over their actions. We have constantly maintained that, so far as Afghanistan is concerned, the Government were all the time basing their predictions on the best possible scenario.
	The Prime Minister went on the record on Saturday to say that whatever our forces needed for Afghanistan would be found and supplied. Splendid. But how does this Statement point to specific actions to give effect to that promise?
	The Government's decision in 2004 to cut the size of the Army has now been exposed as a serious misjudgement, jeopardising both the morale and the safety of our troops. The number of soldiers dismissed from the Army for going absent without leave has nearly doubled since the start of the Iraq war. The Government are putting the lives of our Armed Forces even more at risk with ageing or inadequate equipment. There is an alarming shortage both of equipment—for example, helicopters in Afghanistan—and of personnel. We cannot persist with a situation where the Army is waging extended campaigns while relying heavily on the Reserve Forces to plug the shortfall.
	One of the most striking features of both campaigns is how public confidence has been lost. There is a widespread belief that we are not being told the scale of the human cost of the conflict. We need to be honest with the public, as the US Government have been. The number of casualties is far too low for the number of fatalities, whether judged by a typical ratio of fatalities to casualties or by the discrepancy with US casualty figures, where there are eight times as many casualties as fatalities. That makes the figures simply not credible. Can the Minister tell the House how many casualties have been sustained in Afghanistan and can he give the House a definition of "casualty"?
	Finally, we welcome the Statement's objective: to give our injured servicemen and women the best medical care available. That will always be with the NHS. But wounded soldiers have been let down by a failure of "bedside" rather than "clinical" care. What are the Government planning to do to put that right—in particular, to provide more secure military wards manned by service nurses?

Lord Garden: My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for repeating in your Lordships' House the Defence Secretary's Statement. From these Benches, we join in paying tribute to our brave men and women in the Armed Forces serving under very difficult and challenging circumstances.
	Looking first at the Statement's reference to Iraq and Afghanistan, I again regret that we are having to respond to developments in those two difficult and important operations through the process of a Statement rather than full debates, as we should have. On Iraq, there is much optimism in the Statement but no assessment of why things have been going so badly. Are the Iraqi people really, as it says, seeing,
	"improvements in their daily lives"
	when they now die violently at the rate of about 100 per day? Does the Minister agree with the assessment of his colleague, Jack Straw, that the situation is "dire"? Does he agree with the US Marine Corps Colonel Devlin's intelligence assessment sent to the Pentagon about al-Anbar province, in which he said that there were no functioning central Iraqi government institutions in the province and that local governments were under the "control of the insurgents"?
	In our area of responsibility, can the Minister tell us in more detail what has been the trend in the security situation? The Statement refers to the handing over of responsibility in two areas. How has al-Muthanna province been in terms of violence and governance since our withdrawal in June? In Basra, what progress has been made in the difficult relationships with the local police?
	Most importantly, what is our strategy for the future of Iraq? The Statement talks about there being much debate about the way forward. Are the British Government involved in the work of the US envoy James Baker? What does the Minister feel about the widely discussed US strategy for dividing the country into three parts? What are we going to do if that becomes US policy?
	Turning to Afghanistan, as the Statement says, the latest extension of the NATO mission is to cover the whole of the country. That means that NATO is now responsible for all of Afghanistan, but there are still 8,000 US-led troops operating under Operation Enduring Freedom and all their air power is retained under American control. The Pentagon press statement issued at the same time as the NATO press statement states:
	"We"—
	meaning the US—
	"will continue to lead the counter-terrorism operations in Afghanistan, train and equip the Afghan national security forces and assist with reconstruction".
	So we now have both NATO and Operation Enduring Freedom doing the same jobs in overlapping geographical areas. Can the Minister share with us the military logic behind that arrangement?
	Next, how are the Government responding to General Richards's assessment reported yesterday morning that we must improve the lot of the Afghans within the next six months if they are not to turn to the Taliban for support? It is also clear that there is a turf war between the military and development agencies in helping Afghanistan—I trust that we shall explore that more deeply when we debate the Unstarred Question this evening. Can the Minister assure us that the Ministry of Defence is totally content with the work that the Department for International Development is doing and does not have its eyes on the department's funding?
	Turning to the pay proposals in the Statement, from these Benches we welcome the tangible recognition through a flat-rate, tax-free operational bonus that the services are not just working in challenging circumstances but have also been operating beyond the defence planning assumptions year after year. We agree that a straight payment is better than trying to introduce some complex tax regime through taking them out of the tax bracket when they are away. However, it will take us some time to consider the detail, which is not in the Statement, to decide how different servicemen and women are affected and it will be very important that it is seen as a fair system by all members of the Armed Forces and the reserves. Can the Minister assure us that there will be an opportunity for the MoD to change the arrangements when anomalies surface, as they certainly will over the coming months? I also want to know how the Armed Forces Pay Review Body will treat this allowance. It will be bad if we end up having the X factor reduced next April because of the allowance that is now being implemented. Let us hope it is exempted from that.
	I welcome in the Statement the assurance that the defence budget will not have to fund this extra money from the current budget. I trust that that will remain the case into future years.
	Finally, more generally, what are the Government doing about the degree of tasking that our Armed Forces are now experiencing? They need either more people or fewer tasks. The Government must do something soon.

Lord Drayson: My Lords, I am grateful for the support that Members on the Benches opposite have given for the aims of our operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and for the challenges that our forces face in those theatres. The points that they have made have focused on the implementation of these operations, and on criticisms about the way in which we have gone about it.
	First, as a Defence Minister, I do not accept the assertion of the noble Lord, Lord Astor, that Ministers are living in an unreal world, unconnected with what is going on on the ground. I came back from Afghanistan on Sunday having spent some considerable time with our troops at Camp Bastion, at Kandahar and at Kabul, ensuring that I absolutely understood the challenges that they have faced in the past six months, to learn the lessons that need to be learnt about the way in which we respond to the threat that we have encountered and to ensure that we in the Ministry of Defence do absolutely everything that we need to do to support our forces. As the noble Lord said, the Prime Minister made a statement on Saturday that our forces will have everything that they need to carry out these operations.
	Being the Minister responsible for defence equipment means ensuring that our processes for delivering urgent operational requirements into theatre are as effective as possible. I spent a considerable amount of time ensuring that I understood what we need to do to learn from the situation on the ground in both Iraq and Afghanistan and to respond to that. That is working. The defence procurement reforms that we have introduced have led to a more responsive system that is delivering the equipment. There is no doubt that we have issues—the noble Lord opposite has mentioned helicopters several times—and we accept that our helicopter capacity is deficient. As I said yesterday in this House, we are implementing several measures to improve the situation urgently. We have found that helicopters are an important force-multiplier, particularly in Afghanistan, and there are several areas of development that we are undertaking to put ourselves in a position to ensure that, at the next roulement, we have the helicopter capacity to meet any potential threat.
	Noble Lords made a point about ageing and inadequate equipment. It is simply not the case across the piece. I accept that there are examples of equipment that has been very hard worked. The WMIK vehicles, which the Parachute Regiment has been using, are being replaced by Viking vehicles, which are new and, I must say, impressive vehicles, which the marines will be taking into theatre. We need to get the WMIK vehicles back and ensure that they are repaired and replaced quickly. We are seeing an improvement. I am monitoring closely the delivery of urgent operational requirements into theatre to ensure that we are delivering what our troops need. I simply do not accept that our procurement process is not responding in the way noble Lords describe.
	The noble Lord, Lord Astor, asked specifically about casualty figures. Between 1 January and 31 July 2006, which are the latest figures that I have—I should add that a Question will be asked in the House on Monday about the specifics of casualty figures—four UK personnel were categorised as very seriously injured from all causes excluding disease, five UK personnel were categorised as seriously injured from all causes excluding disease, and 125 UK personnel were aero-medically evacuated from Afghanistan as a result of all causes. I am happy to write to the noble Lord. During my visit last week, I spoke to the commander of the field hospital in Camp Bastion, who gave me some figures from the experience that the hospital is having. He mentioned specifically the ratio of troops killed in action to casualties and I would be very happy to expand on that.
	On the use of Reserve Forces and general overstretch, we must recognise that it is the policy of this Government to change the way in which our Reserve Forces are now used with our Regular Army on operations. We have found that that has been very effective. It is not a case of using the Reserve Forces because we do not have sufficient Regular Army to do the job. It is a part of the one-army approach which we are now adopting.
	Today, in a Question, we debated clinical care of our military and what is being done. As the Statement said, we do not accept that we do not have sufficient medical care for our Armed Forces. I have visited the field hospitals in Iraq and Afghanistan, and our facilities in Selly Oak, Birmingham; I have spoken to soldiers about this issue. Our level of care on operations is first class. Selly Oak has delivered in a major hospital the necessary care for the cases coming back from operations. We cannot go back to the past and military hospitals. Frankly, they are unable to provide the appropriate level of sophistication and equipment to care for our people properly. We must recognise that the numbers of people in the military for whom we have to care is relatively small. As the Statement said, the best way to ensure that there is proper care is to provide it under the NHS.
	On our strategy in Afghanistan, last Friday, General Richards made clear to me that the recent change in the command and operation, and the way in which the Afghan Government are focusing on development zones in the country, was a positive development. The progress made by the military in the past six months gives us a tremendous opportunity, which we must take now. One concern made to me by our military commanders in the field is that the pace of reconstruction, which takes place now and during the winter when traditionally the fighting is less, is established by next spring. I know that there is an active effort in discussions on how we can accelerate that.
	In answer to the noble Lord's question on whether I am content with what DfID and the FCO are doing, there is room for us to further leverage the work of the military in partnership with and together with the work of DfID and the NGOs. I have heard from military commanders that additional resources on the ground would be very effective and complementary to the work being done by DfID and the FCO.
	We have a clear strategy for Iraq. It is true that the situation in Iraq is very difficult, which we accept. However, there is a strategy of developing a security framework in the provinces. When we feel that we have got to the point where the Iraqi police and army have the capability to take over a province we hand it over. During the summer, we successfully did that in two provinces. As regards the level of violence in those provinces, it is low. The operational over watch which we are providing has been effective. No doubt, the real challenge is in the cities; mostly in Baghdad, but also in Basra. The military strategy taking place locally is to go block-by-block through those cities to establish law and order, clear out the gangs who are killing people, stop sectarian violence and establish reconstruction. As the Statement said, it is early days to see whether that will be effective. The early indication is that it is. Operation Sinbad in Basra aims to do that and it will take many months. By the end, we will see whether it has been successful. Its success depends on whether local political support becomes further established in the city. As that is established, our strategy will be then to withdraw and provide operational over watch in the way that we have in the other provinces.
	It is not true to say that we do not have a clear strategy. In both countries we know absolutely what our plan is, but these are difficult circumstances requiring the support and development of local government and law and order in parallel with it.
	I shall take away the noble Lord's point about potential anomalies in pay proposals. I do not know the process by which we will deal with anomalies should they arise, but I am sure that we will undertake to address them if they are found. I can confirm to the House that the X factor will not be reduced as a result of these proposals. This is in addition to the present pay structure, and I am sure that the pay review body will take it into consideration. I expect the pay review body to fully take into account the enduring pressure that our Armed Forces are under, the fantastic response they are making to the challenge of operations, and the local market conditions which exist. I spoke to a lance corporal in 3 Para last week going back to Colchester. It is important that that young corporal knows that he can get on the property ladder in Colchester, and we are committed to providing a pay package which allows him to do so.

The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, it has been reported that there are restrictions on German behaviour in Afghanistan and that the Luftwaffe will not fly at night. There have also been reports of other members of NATO being bound by rules that do not apply to us or the Canadians. Will the Minister please make representations to the heirs of Schamhorst, Blücher and Gneisenau that they should behave like proper soldiers and not ban flying at night?
	Secondly, has the policy of platoon garrisons dotted about north Helmand province been altered? One platoon, or its equivalent, tied up in one fort, surrounded by a lot of screaming Afghans shooting at them does nobody any good whatever and just causes casualties and mayhem all around. That seems to have been what is happening.

Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement. A lot has been heard today, both now and in the early Question, about the medical support being given in Selly Oak hospital. However, not much has been heard about the operations of the Defence Medical Welfare Service, which the Minister will know was set up at the time of the Gulf War to provide psychological and psychiatric support to people after they had left hospital. In particular, I am concerned about the degree of support being given to members of the reserve forces, who do not remain under regular military observation when they return to the community, because there are disturbing stories that they are not being well supported in view of the strain, and other things, that they have been under during operations.

The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, the amendment stands in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater of Butterstone.
	For 70 years the law has made it quite clear that for children involved in criminal proceedings the expectation is that reporting restrictions will not be lifted except in exceptional circumstances. In recent years, the Government have introduced legislation so that for children involved in anti-social behaviour order proceedings there is an expectation that reporting restrictions will be lifted except in exceptional circumstances. The effect of the amendment would be to reverse the situation to the status quo ante, where it stood for 70 years.
	I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam of Brighton, for his helpful reply in Committee. He recognised the concerns about the welfare of these children and gave a very balanced analysis of the problem, drawing on his experience of being a leader of a local authority where these problems arise.
	The purpose of bringing this back on Report is to hear further from him on the support for families and children given these orders. The work that the Government are doing to support families is encouraging, but as we established in Committee only slightly more than 1 per cent of parents with these children were given parenting orders. Given that these orders were so effective, it seemed surprising and disappointing that those families were not being supported in that way.
	The Minister countered by saying that each child was given a needs assessment, but we know from experience elsewhere that it is all very well sometimes to provide an assessment of needs but it is the services that follow and the resources that are provided that matter. Of particular concern is that significant numbers of the children are under the age of 15 and they can be as young as 10. It was quite clear from the response given by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, that very often the names and photographs of children as young as 12 would be publicised in the local community, sometimes in a leaflet and sometimes in the local media. Tabloids have picked up the photographs of children as young as 12 and publicised them in their coverage.
	It is most encouraging to hear the Government's progress with the "respect" action plan to counter anti-social behaviour. For instance, the Prime Minister said this summer:
	"The 'hardest to reach' families are often the ones we need to reach most".
	He went on to say that there is a requirement for earlier intervention with some of these families, who are often socially excluded and socially dysfunctional. It was encouraging to hear the statement by the Minister for Children, Beverley Hughes, about the pilot schemes she has launched in 20 local authorities, targeting parents of eight to 13 year-olds with the most disruptive behaviour. Brighton and Hove's local authority features in that.
	The general sense is that the Government's policy in this area is moving in a positive direction, but I regret that, over the eight years that these orders have been in place, no attempt has been made, as far as I can see, to determine what the impact has been on these children and their siblings of having their identities publicised in the local areas. That causes us great concern, particularly, as we heard in Committee, when some of these children have disabilities, learning difficulties, Asperger syndrome and so on. Two-thirds of these children have their cases heard in adult courts. It was only in February this year that guidance was sent out that magistrates in such courts should have training in youth justice matters to assess those sensitive cases. I would be grateful to hear from the Minister, either later or in writing, what monitoring has been taking place of how effectively that guidance is being implemented. These children's cases are reviewed after one year. That has recently been introduced, and is very welcome. Again, I would appreciate how that is being monitored.
	These are complex matters. It is extremely difficult to draw the balance between the welfare and the rights of these children and the terrible impact their behaviours can have on their communities. I look to the Minister to provide more assurance on how the Government are supporting these children and families. I beg to move.

Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, in Committee I agreed to withdraw the amendment, encouraged by the Minister who said that during the summer the Government would look in more detail at the proposals of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, and that she hoped and expected to table government amendments on Report to address the concerns that had been raised. She also said that, like the Chief Inspector of Prisons, the new chief inspector, not Ministers, would continue to be able to set the criteria for inspections and gave assurance that prison inspection would be based on domestic and human rights standards rather than on service standards or government targets.
	I was disappointed, first, that the Minister could not meet me during the Recess to discuss the amendments and, secondly, that the government amendments have not satisfied either the proposals of the Joint Committee or the concerns that were expressed or spelt out, and in particular that the Minister's undertakings are not included in them. Only two of the six guarantees of the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, required by the Joint Committee have been satisfied. Government Amendment No. 93 covers the fact that inspections must be based on visits and government Amendment No. 97 covers unannounced inspections, but none of the characteristics of independent inspection of prisons of the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, has been satisfied; in other words, what I always regarded as the particular strengths of the position of the independent Chief Inspector of Prisons—namely, that you had the right to go anywhere unannounced and the right to set your own criteria, that there would be no reduction in a programme of regular inspections and that you reported directly to the Home Secretary and the public. Those strengths are to be diminished.
	I have explained before to this House that the inspection of the treatment of and conditions for prisoners is not about value for money. By the same token the inspection of prisons is not the same as the inspection of the management of individual offenders. It is the inspection of a community that is a prison and whether the various parts of it are fit for purpose. The prison and probation inspectorates are currently looking at how this might be done in the same spirit in which the inspectorates have worked together since 1996 on subjects that involve more than two of them. In the case of prisons, this includes health, education, drugs treatment and many other subjects not covered by any of the inspectorates that are subject to this proposal.
	The new criminal justice inspectorate in Northern Ireland already provides a precedent for what I am saying, leaving prisons out of that merger and contracting the inspection of the prisons in Northern Ireland to Her Majesty's Chief Inspector—the acknowledged expert. The purpose of my amendment is to save the Government from repeating a failure of six years ago. They have tried to go down this merger route before. This is not a Home Office proposal resulting from a detailed study related to this Bill, but the Home Office putting flesh on the bones of wider direction—merging 11 public sector inspectorates into four—contained in the Chancellor's 2005 Budget speech.
	In May 2000 the Home Office tried to merge the prisons and probation inspectorates and dropped the proposal six months later because it realised that it made no sense at all to merge them until the prison and probation services had been merged. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, will no doubt remember having to admit to this House that no one was in favour of that proposal. Now it proposes to merge five inspectorates and five different functions working to three separate Secretaries of State. In Committee the Minister talked about the justice inspectorate, but there is not a single justice system working to a single justice Minister, although I am one of those who think that there should be. Unless and until there is, it seems to me to make no more sense to merge these five different inspectorates than it was to merge the two which at least had to work together on some of their responsibilities.
	There is also a worrying lack of clarity about when this is to take place. In Committee the Minister told us that the Government would stage the transition of the new inspectorate and not abolish the Chief Inspector of Prisons until they were satisfied that the new chief inspector was ready effectively to carry out the prisons inspection duty. But a week before that the Home Secretary said that the post of Chief Inspector of Prisons would be abolished in March 2008 at the end of Miss Owers's contract. There is a conflict here and I should like to know which is right.
	Two weeks ago I was interviewed by head-hunters who are looking for what the noble Baroness, Lady Billingham, described in a previous debate as a superhuman being—the new chief inspector. The head-hunters are looking for someone who can speak with first-hand experience of inspecting 140 prisons, can advise 50 chief constables on personnel as well as operational matters, knows the intricacies of the Crown Prosecution, courts and probation services, is able to deal with three Secretaries of State and 10 other Ministers, can balance limited budget resources between five separate operations each of which has a full programme, has time to read and edit more than 300 reports each year and can carry out the media, official and representational tasks currently undertaken by five people in three ministries. The net effect will be that because no one person could possibly do this the chief inspector will either have to delegate tasks to the deputy currently doing them or take him or her with him to provide first as opposed to second-hand evidence. But this, of course, is the very duplication that the Government say they are trying to avoid.
	I wish to make two points on the subject of duplication. First, there is no duplication at present between any of the five inspectorates. Any duplication in this area is between the plethora of regulators and auditors, many of them introduced by this Government. Secondly, where is the single immigration regulator, announced in July in the Home Office paper Fair, Effective, Transparent and Trusted, to sit? Is this to be a fifth inspectorate? Is it to be included in the proposed merger that we are discussing? Is it to take over the responsibilities of the inspectorate of prisons listed in the Bill? Is it to be the independent monitor required under the optional protocol and not included in the government amendments? If so, will that independence satisfy the joint committee of the United Nations?
	The disastrous introduction of the National Offender Management Service should have provided a salutary lesson on the dangers of introducing theories before they have been properly thought through and evaluated. The Minister has talked about a joined-up offender management demanding a new type of inspection. However, less than half of the 80,000 in prison are serving sentences that include probation supervision, and less than half of the over 250,000 offenders in the hands of the probation service have come from prison. Therefore, only a minority of offenders are subject to the main direction of NOMS. By the same token, only 20 per cent of police time is connected with the criminal justice system, with the remaining 80 per cent being devoted to the prevention of crime; and yet there is no definition in the Bill of what community safety means.
	In July, the National Audit Office published a paper called Wider Lessons for Public Sector Mergers of Regulatory Agencies. There are 15 recommendations, one of which does not apply to this merger because it is about retirement pay. As far as I can see, however, all the other 14 recommendations have been ignored. I will quote just two:
	"Base the decision ... on a balanced judgement of whether the projected benefits justify the costs of carrying out the merger",
	and,
	"Ensure there is a plan to mitigate the risks of disruption to business as usual and the interests of stakeholders".
	In the case of the inspection of prisons, the stakeholders include the public. It is no good assuming that what is proposed is do-able because some of what is being done should not be done. In the case of the prisons inspectorate, I ask what should not be done. I have to admit that I always overspent my budget every year, because I could not do what was required of me with what I had been given. Now there is to be less with which to do more, so the business is to be disrupted. I explain that by the fact that there are to be transitional costs of some £2.2 million, which are to be taken out of the existing inspectorates' budgets, and that means that what they will be able to do will be reduced. In addition, the prisons inspectorate is now to be required to inspect prison cells, court cells and transport. If it has to do that it needs extra resources, but if it is not given the resources it will have to cut down the existing programme, which is not something that the public would welcome.
	The prison system is, as we all know, in crisis. In Committee, the Minister described it as being "of superb construction". Well, that construction has proved unequal to the task, and in addition the director-general has admitted in public that several thousand prison officers are corrupt. Throughout my time as chief inspector, my chief concern was that there was a difference between the facts that I was disclosing in my inspections and the data given to Ministers by officials and official sources. Both I and my successor have commented on this many times, largely on the grounds that you cannot make sound decisions based on fudged and inaccurate data.
	Let us just look at the last inspection of Pentonville, quoted in the most powerful article by the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, in the Observer on Sunday. He quoted the lack of basic requirements, including vermin infestation and complaints about assaults and bad treatment of staff. He did not, however, mention one other complaint that the inspector mentioned, namely that the food ran out during lunch—the only hot meal of the day. For me, the two worst aspects of the report were, first, that there was no supportive first-night strategy, and night staff did not know the location of new arrivals, which suggests to me that all is not well about suicide prevention despite the assurances that we are given. Secondly, unemployed prisoners, who represented half the population, had only an average of 2.5 hours out of cell, while employed prisoners were out for about seven hours. The average across the prison was five hours, which is far less than the over eight hours that the prison was reporting. I mention that because I wonder whether under the proposed new regime those sorts of uncomfortable details will be allowed to be published.
	As a soldier, I learnt that at times of crisis the one thing that you need above all is timely, accurate information. The current crisis has come about in part because the Government have failed to listen to timely, accurate information provided by their one independent and objective source—the independent prisons inspectorate. But you don't shoot the messenger just because you don't like the message.
	All Members of this House admire not only the Minister's ability but also her unswerving loyalty to her party's line. Never having been a member of a political party, I speak as an informed member of the public, knowing that what is being proposed is, as has been said to me in a letter, nothing more and nothing less than dangerous nonsense whose practicalities and consequences have not been properly thought through. Were I the Minister, particularly at a time of crisis such as our prisons are going through now, the last thing that I would want to lose would be my one source of objective, independent information. Protest though the Minister undoubtedly will, a Deputy Chief Inspector of Justice, Community Safety and Custody (Prisons) who is subordinate to a chief inspector, subject to the direction of 13 different Ministers and required to have regard to such aspects of government policy as Ministers in three separate ministries may direct, simply is not as independent as the current stand-alone Chief Inspector of Prisons. I repeat sentiments that the Minister will recall were expressed from every side of the House in Committee, in the hope of preventing the Government from committing an act of wilful and unnecessary destruction of a beacon of our criminal justice system. I beg to move.

The Lord Bishop of Worcester: My Lords, we on these Benches have a particular interest in this matter. These Benches are the seat of people who, from the beginning of the modern prison service, have had the right to enter and inspect. That right was exercised by the Lords Spiritual because of a recognition that you cannot do anything more serious to anybody than deprive them of their liberty, and that that act itself is completely unique in the relations between the state and the subject. It deserves careful and independent scrutiny, and that scrutiny is of the first importance to be maintained. Of course, no one on these Benches today would wish to suggest that we return to the custom that the only source of independent inspection should be diocesan Bishops, because we all recognise that that work these days requires independence, professionalism and resources. That does not mean that we do not continue to have an interest in this area of work, and all my colleagues share with me as Bishop to prisons a concern that this feature of our prisons regime should be sustained.
	I am even more astonished than I am outraged by this government proposal. I am astonished because it seems to be depriving the Government of one of the sources not only of independent judgment—as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, said—but of public support for those aspects of crime reduction that have most engaged the Minister's committed attention. She has rightly asked representatives of the faith communities, the voluntary sector and commercial organisations to join with the Government in giving assistance to ensuring that people who have offended are enabled to make the best possible transition to society. There is no stronger ally of the Government in that respect than the chief inspector who examines prisons precisely to ensure that they are fit for the purpose of returning people to society with the best chance of not reoffending.
	How does the chief inspector become such a formidable ally of the Minister and her concerns? The chief inspector does so by her direct and prestigious access to public media. The chief inspectors that we have had—sparing the blushes of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, himself—are remarkable examples of what happens when you have a highly competent, committed, objective and serious person inhabiting an office of enormous public prestige under the Crown. That is what is required of that person—to gain access to the public media and to gain publicity for the main recommendations of the inspectorate's reports. It is simply not conceivable that a subordinate official of the enormous inspectorate that the Government are thinking of creating will have that kind of access.
	We should be clear that we are talking about abolition and not merger here, because there will never again be, if this provision passes into law, a Chief Inspector of Prisons. The result will be that the public sympathy and interest which have been gained during the time of the past office holders will simply disappear.
	I am astonished that the Minister, who has such a strong commitment to the rehabilitative purposes of the criminal justice system in general and of prisons in particular, should be prepared to lose that element of support in this work. In the process she has managed to alienate, as far as I am aware, every person and responsible organisation that has invested attention in prison reform—something to which she is also committed. She has lost the sympathy of faith groups, communities and Churches that, on the basis of that commitment, have been prepared to enter into the faith alliances that she has promoted, because we now suspect that the Government's attitude to prison reform is far more detached and cynical than we had supposed.
	This situation is of the greatest seriousness. I urge the Minister to think again, and I urge your Lordships seriously to consider supporting the amendment in a Division and standing firmly by it in the subsequent stages of the Bill.

Viscount Slim: My Lords, many years ago, a man called Blake escaped from prison, and the Mountbatten report was produced afterwards. At the end of that report, I was approached, along with some rather special people with whom I was living at the time, and asked to go round prisons, to look at them and to produce some suggestions about making them harder to escape from. I had the full support of every prison governor and many of the senior warders. I visited, with a little team, and lived in prison. I hope we did our job well.
	I got very close to the then inspector of prisons whom I thought was a remarkable man. Even then he was worried. I shall not say which political party was in power and speaking from these Benches it does not really matter. He told me that because there had been a disaster, the heavy hand of government was on him every day—harder and harder—and he was frightened of losing his independence as the Chief Inspector of Prisons. We did what we could to help him—I am not saying that that was very successful—but the government of the day did not treat him particularly well. The lesson I learnt over several months in the prisons business was that such a man or woman must be entirely independent, reporting only to the very highest in the land at top Secretary of State level. I am rather horrified by what is being proposed tonight. I think it is completely wrong.

Lord Corbett of Castle Vale: My Lords, I apologise for not being present in July, but I was taken ill. I remind the House that I have the privilege of chairing the All-Party Group on Penal Affairs. The Government's proposal to abolish the independent inspector of prisons is entirely perverse, not least at this time. My noble friend Lady Quin objected to the word "crisis", but perhaps we can agree on the word "failure". Any system that spends £37,000 of taxpayers' money every year on locking up each prisoner when two years later 73 in every 100 are back behind bars must be rated as a failure. I am bothered and alarmed that there is not more public concern over that waste of resources. Something clearly is not working in the prison system.
	I am especially bothered about the proposals relating to the inspector of prisons as it is precisely at times of overcrowding, with jails bulging at the gates, that added pressures are put on staff. Added pressures on staff mean that mistakes are made, rules are broken and the rights of those whom we lock up are not respected, but ignored. The bigger the pressures on overcrowding, the more mistakes are made, and any attempt at sensible rehabilitation and proper, consistent education goes out the window as well. That is bad enough and adds to the waste of resources but now, because of the pressures on staff, under the Government's proposals, those behind locked doors will not be properly inspected.
	I would like the Minister to explain to the House what extra benefits we shall receive from this new jumbo system of inspection of our prisons. What is Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons not doing now that will be more effectively done under this amalgamated system? I hope my noble friend can spell that out because there has to be a reason for this proposal that makes some sense. It gives me no pleasure to say that the Government will not have my support tonight on this proposal. They do not deserve it.
	We have an outstanding system of inspection of our prisons that is literally the envy of the world. I agree with every word that the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, a very distinguished former Chief Inspector of Prisons, has said. People from all over the world beat a path to the door of whoever holds the office of Chief Inspector of Prisons to learn how we do this. The pity is that, dare I say, over the years successive governments and successive Home Secretaries have not taken enough notice of what inspectors have said. Is it not right that time without number the response is, "That was six or eight or nine months ago and most of these recommendations have been put in place"? We know that that simply is not the case.
	I urge the Minister to listen to what is being said all around the House. This system deserves and demands to be kept in place, especially at times when we are running out of cells in which to put convicted prisoners. I hope that she will listen and abandon this proposal.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I understood him to have felt that. I do not share his anxiety. We have understood that inspection, with all its rigour and its painful, acute attention, brings to our scrutiny something that nothing else could give us. I agree with all those who say that we demand and need that level of acute objectivity. I do not hesitate to say that there are some who are thereby greatly assisted in Government. The argument in support of certain changes and difficulties becomes easier if there is support, encouragement, information and data in a report, enabling them to make it with greater power. I see the noble Lord, Lord Elton, who has doubtless had a common experience, nodding his head. I make it plain to the House that we do not make these changes on the basis that they will dilute, divert or in any way subtract from the acuity which has been brought to bear on this issue. Inspection has value.
	However, as wonderful as our inspector of prisons is now and has been, all the successors in title are equally difficult and long may it be so. Noble Lords will perhaps remember his honour Judge Tumim, who was succeeded by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. Anyone who thought that the replacement would make it easier soon learnt their mistake. After the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, shuffled off this particular mortal coil, Anne Owers took up the cudgels. She has been equally vigorous. We have on each occasion found someone of real calibre to discharge this duty. If anyone wishes to know whether super-human beings exist, they need only listen to the debates in this House. We seem to have a large number of them here.
	Our proposals will not undermine the quality of inspection. My noble friend Lord Corbett asked what this new inspectorate adds. It adds a great deal. I remind the House that we are talking about five independent inspectorates, each of them excellent. We rely on each to give us that level of change. Things have changed, however, and I must remind the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, how much. He talked about a justice inspectorate working to a single Minister, and points out that there are three. On a number of occasions, I have shared with this House the significant changes since the 2003 Act. The creation of the National Criminal Justice Board with the local criminal justice boards means that the three Ministers, together with the subordinate Ministers who discharge this duty, come together in the National Criminal Justice Board every month to make significant decisions about how the criminal justice system should be managed end to end.
	Through that process, we have learnt that the system must be just that if we are to protect individuals, and provide rehabilitation and change. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Worcester said that he was shocked and surprised. I confess that I was shocked and surprised that he should think that we are in any way cynical about our work. I assure him that the passion we feel for changing is by no means diminished, and any action in this regard, although we may disagree, is not due to any degree of male fides. I hope that he will accept that as the truth.
	Let us look at the added value. There are huge gaps in what we do and what we know, which must be filled. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, said that while 80,000 people are in our prisons, only a small percentage would be subject to supervision. I again remind him of the changes in the 2003 Act, meaning that in the majority of sentences people will spend part of their time in custody and the rest in the community.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, the system we are putting in place is not simply to deal with the situation today, but the whole framework we wish to have in place for the criminal justice system as a whole. We are moving to a situation when it will not just be the period in prison, but will also extend to the period in the community. We are determined to reduce the unacceptable level of recidivism. That involves the seven pathways—which the noble Lord will know about—the work we must do across the piece, and the link between the juvenile estate and the adult estate and making sure they dovetail. We are not prescribing a framework for what is now, but what will be. That is an important issue.
	We believe that we have fully registered the concerns about dilution of prisons inspectorates. The Bill preserves the existing remit of the Chief Inspector of Prisons as a special duty. It places a statutory duty on the chief inspector to maintain expertise in inspectorate staff. Transition will be managed to ensure business continuity. On the date, we have of course made plain that this will take time. We said that we would only abolish the prisons inspectorate when the new chief inspector is fully able to take on the role. To facilitate a smooth transition, the appointment of the current Chief Inspector of Prisons has been extended until April 2008. It is hoped that the timetable will encompass such a smooth transition before then. However, it is of course open to Ministers to review a further extension if the timetable proves not to fit into the April 2008 framework. That is what we intend, and how we propose to deal with it.
	There has been a suggestion that this could be a cost issue—my noble friend Lady Quin was concerned about costs. I assure her and the House that we expect a one-off cost of setting up the inspectorate of about £2 million. Over time, there should be some efficiency savings, but we expect to maintain total annual funding at broadly existing levels: approximately £20 million per year. Those costs will be met by the business areas in the Home Office, the Department for Constitutional Affairs and the office of the Attorney-General, who are responsible for funding the existing five—

Lord Brennan: My Lords, I commend the Government's programme for Afghanistan, but I recommend that they pursue that programme, first, with a considered and flexible strategy, secondly with caution, and thirdly with the opportunity for regular review. Above all, the Government must strive to avoid a significant gap being created between their political aspirations and the capacity to execute those aspirations with the military or in the development field, both of which are inextricably linked. I take this cautious view because historically Afghanistan is a complex and difficult geopolitical arena militarily. It survived 20 Russian divisions and saw the rise and fall of the Taliban in bloody circumstances. There is a Pashtun revival and a porous border with Pakistan, so history suggests the caution that I have recommended. With regard to aid, it is a misuse of words to speak of reconstruction in Afghanistan. Rather, it is a process of construction. That means time, money and long-term effort and commitment. The question is whether it will work for development.
	Militarily and in the field of development, this country should determine what is best for that country and what is within our reasonable capacity to help it to achieve that. That means considering both the short-term and the long-term strategy. As of 5 October, NATO has taken military command of the military situation in Afghanistan under the leadership of Brigadier-General Richards. Military men in his position are careful in their choice of words. Earlier this week, he said that we were at a tipping point and had six months in which to achieve a significant change so that the people are with us and are not driven against us. That is a very tight and very tough timetable within which to achieve his declared objective of having the people come on the side of NATO and the Afghan Government. So what is the short-term strategy?
	Secondly, I turn to the long term. History demands that if you enter Afghanistan to seek to change it you thereby commit yourself to a process of a number of years. That commitment I understand to have been made by this country and its partners in NATO. They must fulfil that commitment; that is, all of them, not just us. NATO is with us and its member countries acting as a group of common partners with shared objectives, which means that you have to commit yourself to the responsibility of supply and potential damage to your troops. At the moment, the relationship of combat troops to the rest in NATO is wholly out of proportion. How can NATO, therefore, be seen to make that change unless there is more commitment?
	Thirdly, do we have enough strategic assets as a NATO force, not just British helicopters for British troops? What is our alternative strategy if it is not to be NATO, as the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Boyce, raised this afternoon? Finally, since 2001 we have contributed £390 million to that country through DfID in aid. It is our fifth largest target for donations and we are the second largest aid provider. Have we carried out a results-based analysis? Is it going the right way? These are very large sums of money to direct to Afghanistan. I regret to mention the introduction of the Promulgation of Virtue and Prohibition of Vice Committee. The title bemuses us, but what does it mean for women in Afghanistan if we are spending this kind of money? I close positively. We as a Government are giving leadership, which means responsibility by us to lead others in the objectives that we have declared.

Lord Hannay of Chiswick: My Lords, there seems no point in denying that things have not gone as well in Afghanistan as was hoped and, perhaps, unrealistically expected when the Taliban regime collapsed five years ago. We underestimated the degree of failure of the Afghan state after a decade of Soviet occupation and another decade of civil war. We underestimated the intractability of the problems posed by the fissiparous tendencies of the different ethnic groups, by the longstanding tradition of interference in Afghanistan by its neighbours and by the grip that drug production had taken on Afghanistan's otherwise almost non-existent rural economy. We did, here as in many other places, fail to grasp what a very long, complex task peace-building inevitably is in a failed state. It is good that the Question introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Garden, gives us an opportunity to look at all this and reflect on it.
	One hears quite a few voices suggesting that we and our NATO allies are unwise to commit ourselves to new and demanding security operations in the south of the country and that the international community as a whole is trying to achieve the impossible task of helping Afghanistan become a stable, working state with reasonably democratic institutions. Before following that line of reasoning, it is as well to consider the alternatives. Do we seriously believe that Afghanistan could yet stand on its own feet without any or with less external support than is currently being provided? If not, what would be the likely consequences of our doing less or simply quitting? The Taliban and the forces of religious extremism remain a force to be reckoned with, as do the remnants of al-Qaeda. Can we possibly afford to run the risk of their achieving something similar to their joint control of Afghanistan that existed until 2001? Do we not in any case have a political and moral duty to see through the peace-building tasks that we assumed when we intervened in Afghanistan that year?
	The answers to all of those questions seem to point to our having a national, as well an international, interest in seeing this matter through, and doing so with a will and the necessary resources. But are we and the Afghan Government yet doing all we can to achieve a successful outcome? Is enough being done to marginalise the former war lords and to ensure that they do not return or reassert their control over the instruments of the state? Is enough being done to offer a substantial stake in the new Afghanistan to the Pashtun tribes of the south and the east, without whose active co-operation a peaceful and stable Afghanistan will not be achievable? Have we yet achieved the right policy mix for dealing with the drug problem? I doubt, frankly, if it is possible to give an unhesitatingly affirmative answer to any of those questions.
	Afghanistan has suffered from external interference for hundreds of years and it has sometimes interfered in its neighbours itself. Recently we have heard distant echoes of past quarrels over the tribal areas that straddle the Afghan-Pakistan border, otherwise known as the Durand line. Is it not an essential element of any stabilisation of Afghanistan itself that it and all its neighbours commit themselves to non-interference, to respect for existing frontiers and to a range of confidence-building measures and co-operation? In many parts of the world those objectives are anchored in regional or sub-regional multilateral organisations, which impose legal obligations as well as expressing good intentions. Is it not time to construct some such regional approach around Afghanistan? I raised this point in our debates some five years ago and I do not believe that much has been achieved. Perhaps the Minister can say something now about the Government's thinking on this point.
	And then there is the issue of drugs. I should like to hear the Government's thinking on this. Is there any aspect of the ideas being promoted by the Senlis Council, and which would involve some legitimised production for pharmaceutical purposes, as takes place in certain other countries such as Turkey, which might over time make sense in Afghanistan?
	Clearly security issues lie at the heart of any peace-building effort in Afghanistan. It was surely a mistake to have left large areas to the south and east of the country so long as a kind of free-fire zone for the US forces and the remnants of the Taliban. The successes achieved elsewhere by the provisional reconstruction teams show just how important it is to pursue reconstruction and development at the same time as security. Perhaps the Minister could tell the House how those tasks of reconstruction and development are being pursued in the areas where Britain and other NATO allies have now taken the responsibility for providing security.
	More, much more, could be said on this subject. But I would like to end with one thought, which is in no way specific to Afghanistan. The tasks we have undertaken in Afghanistan will not be successfully achieved if we cannot check and reverse the increasing political alienation that is developing between Muslim countries and the West. That alienation will not be checked and reversed if we—and that in large part means the United States—do not resume without delay a serious effort to solve the Arab-Israel dispute in its entirety. The policy vacuum in this matter over recent years has wrought havoc to our wider objectives—the recent events in the Lebanon being the most recent evidence of that—and it is all set to wreak even more havoc if we do not collectively do something urgently to fill the vacuum with a meaningful peace process which has the united support of the whole international community. That is surely something on which Europe should now give a lead.

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Garden, for pursuing this debate. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, cannot be in her place and I send her the Government's best wishes.
	Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world and is off-track to meet all the millennium development goals. Years of conflict and insecurity have denied basic services that we take for granted, such as healthcare and schooling. One in four Afghan children still dies before their fifth birthday. The reconstruction effort in Afghanistan is certainly a long-term initiative. Achieving our objective of a peaceful, prosperous and secure Afghanistan will be reliant on the support and commitment of donor agencies for many years to come. As my noble friend Lord Brennan said, we must honour that commitment. Do we regularly review our policy on Afghanistan? Yes, we do, both in DfID and across government.
	A prosperous and democratic Afghanistan is crucial to reducing global poverty and increasing stability in the region. For this reason, the UK is the second largest bilateral donor. We are fully committed to Afghanistan's long-term development. At the London conference in January 2006, the UK confirmed this by assigning a 10-year development partnership agreement. This agreement, signed by Prime Minister Blair and President Karzai, commits DfID to provide £330 million in development and assistance over the next three years. That forms part of the UK's overall pledge of £500 million to reduce poverty, improve security in governance and tackle the opium industry. DfID's budget for Afghanistan is £102 million for this year, which will rise to £113 million in 2007-08 and £115 million for 2008-09. In addition, DfID contributes 18 per cent of the European Commission's pledge of €1 billion over 2002-07, and over 10 per cent of the World Bank's spending in Afghanistan of $250 million a year. We also contribute financially to UN programmes and to the Asian Development Bank.
	DfID's programme supports the Government of Afghanistan's interim Afghanistan national development strategy, launched at the London conference. Our programme specifically underpins three of the objectives set out in that document: building effective state institutions, improving economic management and effectiveness of aid, and improving livelihoods for the rural poor. I would certainly concur with the noble Lord, Lord Dahrendorf, that we must work for security, statehood and sustainability, and that is exactly what I believe we are doing.
	DfID believes that the best way to achieve these goals is by supporting Afghans to help themselves. Thus over 70 per cent of our aid goes directly to the Government of Afghanistan. The UK is the largest donor to the government's recurrent budget, covering essential costs such as salaries for teachers and health workers. I note the concerns expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady D'Souza, but we believe that it is the best chance for building effective state institutions that will last. Directing funds through the Government of Afghanistan enhances their accountability and authority and, as we know from experience elsewhere, it is a more effective way of ensuring that development is sustainable. However, I assure the noble Baroness that we shall continue to support NGOs.
	DfID leads the British Government's efforts to develop legal economic alternatives to opium poppy production. We spent approximately £45 million for this purpose last year. Part of this funding contributes to improvements in agricultural opportunities for farmers. This includes research to help identify, test and implement new crops and technologies—for example, improvements in the production of high value crops such as saffron and wheat. We are also promoting other non-farm economic alternatives. This includes small loans, support for small scale local infrastructure and labour-intensive public works. We are providing £20 million over three years to the Microfinance Investment Support Facility, and women receive nearly 80 per cent of the small loans. Like the USA, however, we do not support direct compensation as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, but we support a properly sequenced strategy which means only eradicating poppy crops where legal livelihoods already exist.
	The Government share the disappointment and concern about the increase in opium production in 2006, but we believe the strategy outlined by the Government of Afghanistan is the right one. This requires not just provision of legal economic alternatives, but also effective governance and law enforcement. Some 70 per cent of the increase in planting is in Helmand, reflecting the security situation, whereas in parts of the country where there is better security and better governance, drug cultivation has actually gone down. This is a long-term strategy. Progress will be gradual and will take many years.
	The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, asked about the Senlis Council proposals. The Government of Afghanistan do not support licit cultivation of opium, and we agree with them. The proposals are unrealistic because there would be a risk of a high level of diversion of legal opium into illegal channels. We also understand it is unlikely that licit Afghan opium would be economically viable.
	In Helmand, DfID is working closely with other departments as part of the wider UK effort to promote economic and social development, to help improve governance and bring visible benefits to local people. That is challenging, given the very difficult security environment, but, as the Statement earlier today made clear, there is now a short window of opportunity with a more secure environment for reconstruction and development, thanks to the magnificent efforts of our troops. Government departments are working closely together, and with the Afghans, to bring about tangible improvements. I assure the noble Lord, Lord Garden, that there is common purpose throughout government departments. However, as my noble friend Lord Drayson said, we need further to explore opportunities for the military to undertake projects, but only where security is difficult.
	We are lucky that the British military has considerable experience working in these sorts of environments, and with a range of NGOs. There is a short-term and a long-term strategy, and they are both working in tandem. We have committed over £30 million over the next three years to the Helmand Agriculture and Rural Development Programme, which aims to increase economic opportunities for the rural poor of Helmand through a variety of programmes led by the Government of Afghanistan. We have also contributed £4 million to the delivery of quick-impact activities in Helmand, which are already securing short-term development results and will help create a foundation for longer-term development in the province. They are implemented jointly by DfID, the FCO and the military, and include improving security for schools; building and rebuilding; improving drinking water and sanitation; and building wells and roads.
	With regard to the resurgence of the Taliban on the porous Afghan/Pakistani border, the Pakistani Government have recently agreed, in conjunction with the UNHCR and the Afghan Government, on the need to close down two terrorist training camps in Baluchistan, although the Pakistani Government do not have the means to enforce that. Both governments are working closely with UNHCR to find a long-term solution to the camps. In addition, the FCO, DfID and the MoD, through the Global Conflict Prevention Pool, have just agreed to fund a project that will look at ways of electronic identification of suspect individuals in the camps.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, and others asked about humanitarian assistance and drought in the north-west. Rural development is a key priority for DfID. We expect to spend £35 million this year, almost all through the Government of Afghanistan's budget, which will help ensure that they have predictable funding, thus allowing them to respond to their own priorities, including the drought. We are in regular contact with UNAMA, the Afghan Government and other UN agencies on their assessment of the drought, and we attended the most recent update meeting. The initial drought appeal was launched to secure pledges of in-principle support, prior to the proper assessment of the scale of the drought. The assessment results are due later this month, and we will then consider a UK contribution.
	In relation to internally displaced persons, the UN is providing emergency assistance in the form of non-food items and food assistance. Their estimates suggest that basic needs are being met, and they are not asking for additional funding. The US has set aside funding to support the future return of IDPs in the south and the reconstruction of their homes. It is likely to work through implementing partners such as the International Organisation for Migration, UN-Habitat and local business. The UK has already provided $60,000 to the office of the governor in Helmand to help provide for the immediate needs of IDPs.
	Since 2001, DfID has spent over £390 million on reconstruction and development in Afghanistan. Over this period there has been real progress. Presidential and parliamentary elections were held. Six million children have returned to school, over one-third of whom were girls who, five years ago, were not allowed to attend. Some 35,000 lives have been saved thanks to routine immunisations which our children are given as a matter of course. It is estimated that, in 2005-06, the legal economy grew by 14 per cent.
	With regard to safe access to education for girls and boys and protection for female teachers and government employees working in high-risk areas, the Afghan Government have formulated and begun implementation of a school protection policy. In addition, the provincial reconstruction team is working with the provincial government in Helmand to pilot a school bus transportation system and is considering a number of quick impact projects to provide additional security at the four main schools, including one girls' school in Lashkar Gar. Further support is being considered. The Government deplore the recent killing of Safiye Amajan.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, asked about troops. I do not have an answer to that question but my colleagues have. Indeed, it was probably answered this afternoon in the discussion following the Statement, but I will ensure that the noble Baroness receives that information in writing.
	The Government remain firmly committed to the long-term development of Afghanistan. We will seek to ensure that the achievements that we have seen to date are consolidated and continued and we will work with others to ensure that the critical constraints to further development are overcome. We feel strongly that the Afghan Government must lead the development effort, which is why we need to invest in their development plans and channel our resources through their systems if we are to have enduring impact.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, I move Amendment No. 128 on behalf of my noble friend Lord Northesk. He has asked that I convey his apologies to the House. He simply cannot be present today due to other serious commitments.
	We covered most of the ground pertaining to the amendment in Committee and so I do not propose to dwell on too many of the underlying technicalities. I feel that I would not be able to and I am extremely grateful to my noble friend for providing me with a comprehensive speaking note. I also note that the Government have reformulated the paragraph in the shape of Amendment No. 129 in the name of the Minister. That ties the matter to Section 1 and Section 3 offences in the Computer Misuse Act beyond any doubt and to that extent it is welcome.
	Nevertheless, in the opinion of my noble friend, the substantive flaw of the provision, the likelihood test, remains. As my noble friend explained earlier in our proceedings, this equates to proscribing the supply and distribution of crowbars on the basis that they are likely to be used in the commission of burglary offences. Indeed, it is possible to envisage circumstances where the provision could be deployed to proscribe the supply and distribution of web-browsing and e-mail programs if only because they are more likely than not to be used in the commission of hacking offences.
	The problem here should not be underestimated. To state the obvious, as broadband and, thereby, always-on access to the internet becomes more pervasive, so there is an ever-increasing need for adequately secure and hack-free systems. In Committee the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, who is in his place, made the entirely appropriate point that that need is being serviced more and more regularly by remote access. In this context, as illustrated by my noble friend in Committee, there is a host of examples of software programs, often open source code, that can be used by systems administrators to test that the IT systems are secure, but that could also be used maliciously. They are, by definition, dual purpose tools. Frequently, those are downloaded as of need from trustworthy, that is to say quality assured, sites on the internet.
	However, because of the absence of legal certainty and clarity about how the likelihood test would be applied by the courts, an effect of the provision, if enacted, will be that trustworthy distribution sites of such software in the UK will be closed down rather than face the risk of possible prosecution. Indeed, there is some anecdotal evidence that that is already happening. Bear in mind that there is simply no way of telling whether any given program will be used more extensively by the good guys or by the bad guys—something which can, in any event, vary considerably over time. In consequence, system administrators and the like will have to source their software tools from less trustworthy sites, thereby running the all-too-common risk that they could include some hidden and, more likely than not, malicious, functionalities.
	In one rainy week on holiday in Italy, my husband and I played rather a lot of scrabble. If I had used that word, I think he might have challenged it, but I am sure my noble friend knows what it means.
	In effect, the provision, whether in the form of the current drafting or the amendment of the Minister, all but guarantees that the internet will be considerably less safe for UK users. That must be counterproductive and antipathetic, not only to the Government's intention here, but also to their wider aspiration of making the UK the best place in the world for e-commerce.
	It is also worth contemplating what benefit would accrue were the provision to be enacted. As a generality, the vast bulk of criminal and malicious activity will be caught by the first arm of the clause, subject to the test of intent. Presumably, therefore, the likelihood test is intended to apply in instances where the internet is seeded with harmful, or even malicious, code for potential onward use as an adjunct to hacking activity, perhaps by "script kiddies"—my noble friend is testing me here—"code monkeys" and the like. Without delving too deeply—thank goodness—into the psychology of such individuals, it is highly unlikely that the provision would either prove a deterrent for them or that, in reality, the offence could be adequately investigated and so prosecuted in practice. In sum, therefore, the provision will almost inevitably do much more harm than good.
	In Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Bassam of Brighton, prayed in aid the Government's adherence to the virtues of consultation. As he put it:
	"We consult regularly, take on board the results of those consultations and try to reflect them where relevant in any necessary changes to legislation".—[Official Report, 11/07/06; col. 608.]
	We do not doubt the sincerity of this. Nevertheless, given that my noble friend has not found a single IT professional prepared to endorse the Government's proposition here throughout the two-odd years it has been under consideration, it would be helpful if the Minister could flesh out how the Home Office perceives the industry's attitude towards it.
	I am enormously grateful to my noble friend for his assistance with my speaking note. I hope it will enable the Minister to address the matter fully and I look forward to her reply. I beg to move.

The Earl of Erroll: My Lords, I shall speak to this group, and particularly to my Amendment No. 129A. First, I thank the Government for taking into account some of the comments I made about the difference between making and inventing the tools, and supply and distribution of the tools, which is what they are trying to hit.
	However, I am afraid that their amendment does not quite go far enough. It is a question of effectiveness and whether it works, and I am afraid to say that it will not. I reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay of St Johns, that things like "script kiddies" are quite common terms in the industry. Phishing is a big worry at the moment; I was talking about it only last week.
	The real problem probably stems from something we have just been talking about. I have just been at dinner with the Hansard Society in the Commons, talking about globalisation, regulation and a few other things. This is a typical example. We think we can regulate, but in a global, internet-based world we cannot. People can host these things abroad. They can host sites which will supply tools to allow you to do this, that and the other, and there is nothing we can do to prevent it. They will be hosted on servers abroad by foreign companies, and you cannot do anything about it. If they were hosted on British servers you could give them notice and tell them to remove them or even prosecute them if you were lucky enough.
	Will it work? It will not, I am afraid. It is one of those things that sounds good but will do nothing. What it will do is cause a lot of trouble to large companies that supply perfectly legitimate tools to help people to carry out remote maintenance or use remote access. It will not help parliamentary staff because if someone supplies the tools to them, whereby they can shadow you working on your own terminal in Parliament and thereby help you solve the problem that you just got trapped in, those sorts of tools might be forbidden under the supply rule.
	The Home Office response to this is: "Well of course we won't chase the good guys. We won't go after them. We are only after the bad guys." The trouble with that is that it is all well until an enforcer trying to achieve some other aim threatens someone. I do not think that, as Parliament, we should be passing laws that give power to enforcement agencies to blackmail companies into doing other things for them because they know they can use something like this against them. It is too much of a blanket power.
	Further, it is useful for penetration testing—for instance, people testing to see whether their company systems can be hacked. A typical example of this is phishing. Last week I was sitting next door to a chap called Gary McKinnon, who is the person the Americans are trying to extradite and put in jail for 60 years because he put post-it notes all over the Department of Defense systems. Five years ago he got into their systems because he thought it would be fun to see how good their passwords were. He ran a little program and discovered that a large number of people with Windows access had not bothered to use passwords. For the Department of Defense in America not to check that its stuff was moderately secure and that its senior people at least had passwords to prevent access is stupid. So he thought he would show them how stupid they were.
	As a result of that Gary has got into hot water. I will not go into the merits of the case or whatever, but the department should have been using tools like this to ensure their own security was all right long before Gary got there. And so should we. However, it will make these things illegal and large groups, large banks and so on should be testing that their systems are secure. In fact Parliament should. But, under this provision, whoever supplies you with that tool to test that will be committing an offence. It is all very well to say, "They are the good guys, we won't prosecute them", but I do not think that is good enough. I have great trouble with laws that hand over powers to the enforcers and say, "It is at our discretion whether we are going to prosecute you".
	I stand very strongly on that, having seen and heard of many incidents where people have been told that unless they comply with something else there is an obscure rule and they can throw the book at a company for something else. I know that there will be efforts made at the European level to reverse this provision if we pass it in this form. I was informed of that by some international companies.
	I would prefer to see the amendment of the noble Earl, Lord Northesk, go through and remove the provision altogether. I do not think it will do any good. It is a waste of time. It will not allow you to do anything effective against enforcing what you want. However, I believe that the Minister will not allow that. Therefore, I would suggest that you should either say "more likely than not" if that is what you mean. I suggested last time using the word "primarily"; this time I suggest using "principally". We are looking at the objective of the people supplying or trying to sell these tools. If it is principally to sell it to the hacker community, I do not have a problem. In which case say so in the Bill. We know these things are likely to be used. If the Government mean that it is more likely than not, then they should say more likely than not.
	I would like to push this issue at some stage. I know that there is only one more stage of the Bill. It concerns me greatly that we should leave the matter in this form. Therefore, I would like to hear what the Government have to say.

Lord Lawson of Blaby: My Lords, I apologise for intervening. I am concerned about how this wording will be interpreted. It is clear that anything—whether it be a fast motor car or what we are talking about in this debate—that can be used for a malign purpose is likely to be used by someone of evil intent for that purpose. The wording of the Government's amendment is,
	"is likely to be used",
	which means anything that is capable of being used. That goes much further than this House should be comfortable with. I hope that the Government will therefore give it consideration. With this amendment, they seek to narrow the conditions, but they are not narrowing them at all. Another look at this is warranted. I apologise for intervening.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, that was a welcome intervention. It is precisely why my noble friend Lord Northesk felt that the Government drafting could not be improved: he felt that it was so defective that one could not achieve the right result, so he wants to take out that section. I know that the noble Earl, Lord Erroll, was trying his best to find a better definition that could adequately deliver the safety of use for those properly using the tools—the good guys as opposed to the bad guys, as my noble friend put it.
	I agree with my noble friend that there should be further time for consideration. I know that there is not much time between Report stage and Third Reading, but there will be one week and one day, which is more than there is occasionally. An e-mail will wing its way to my noble friend from me tomorrow, but I am sure that by the time this is on the internet at lunch time he will already be reading the results of our deliberations. I am sure that he will contact all of us to see what needs to be done betwixt now and time for tabling amendments at Third Reading next Tuesday. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
	[Amendment No.133 not moved.]
	Schedule 12 [Schedule to be inserted into the Protection of Children Act 1978]:

Viscount Bridgeman: My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 136. I hope that we, too, can take advantage of the open door. This follows on from the previous grouping spoken to by my noble friend Lady Anelay. Due to time constraints in Committee, I was unable to move the amendment before the Summer Recess.
	As the Joint Committee on Human Rights summarised in its report, the Bill introduces a newer and wider procedure for the forfeiture of indecent photographs of children held by the police. The report stated:
	"The mechanism introduced by the Bill contains a number of safeguards for those who may have an interest in property which is liable to forfeiture under the Bill...There is an opportunity for a person who wishes to contest forfeiture to make a notice of claim. Where a notice of claim is received by the police, forfeiture can only be ordered by a court. The court must order return of the property if not satisfied that it is forfeitable, or if satisfied that the person making the claim has a legitimate reason for possessing it".
	These probing amendments would insert new sub-paragraphs into Schedules 12 and 13 to ensure that, where the court was not satisfied that the relevant property was forfeitable, the relevant officer extinguished all the information that he had obtained from the forfeiture.
	The aim of the amendment is to question whether the police should or would keep copies of information seized in this context if the court had ordered its return. In some ways, it has a parallel in the debate surrounding data protection and whether the police should keep DNA records of innocent individuals on file, although it is a different medium. I beg to move.

Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I shall go carefully, because I am seeking to persuade noble Lords opposite that their amendment is not effective in the way in which they might envisage and could, to an extent, be self-defeating. I ask them to bear with me.
	The provisions in the Bill allow the police to forfeit indecent images of children and the storage equipment that holds them. The amendments would amend our proposed procedures so that, once it is found that the property should be returned to the owner, the police must destroy all information about the property which is in their possession.
	Clauses 44 and 45 and Schedules 12 and 13 amend the current law so as to close a small technical loophole in the law. They will allow the police to forfeit indecent images of children and the devices that hold them following any lawful seizure. As we have explained previously, this is a small loophole, because if the person is convicted of an offence in respect of the material, it can be forfeited on conviction under Section 143 of the Powers of the Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000. These new provisions do not affect that power.
	However, there are limited circumstances in which there may be no conviction. In those cases, the Protection of Children Act 1978 allows the courts to forfeit such articles following a seizure under a warrant under that Act, but the court has no power to forfeit articles brought before it under other powers of seizure; for example, during a fraud investigation. Technically, in such instances, the articles may have to be returned to the offender.
	Our reforms will move the power of forfeiture into the hands of the police, regardless of the powers of seizure used, and will provide an avenue of appeal to the courts for owners or third parties with an interest in the articles. The amendments would require the police to destroy any record of lawfully seized material once the courts have decided that material is non-forfeitable and should be returned to owners.
	I hope that I can persuade noble Lords that these amendments are unnecessary. Their effect would be to require the police to destroy records lawfully made which would otherwise be retained in accordance with current law, including the Data Protection Act 1998, and accepted operational police practice and procedure whenever such property is seized and a court orders its return. The amendments would amount to an unreasonable restriction on the extent to which police are allowed, and expected, to exercise discretion as to the need to retain and use all factually accurate information. This is both in connection with the prevention, detection, investigation and prosecution of crime, and when they are called to account in civil proceedings.
	For example, let us say that in their dealings with a known sex offender, the police believe he no longer has access to a computer in his home and is not viewing indecent images of children or adult pornography. This suggests, in this case, that the individual is of a lower risk and the police, through the Multi-agency Public Protection Arrangements, adapt their management plan accordingly. However, evidence comes to light that the offender's credit card has been used to purchase indecent images of children over the internet and the police arrest the offender and find a laptop computer in his home. The images appear, to the police and Crown Prosecution Service, to be of children aged 16 or 17 but the court finds that they are of an adult aged 18 or over. Therefore, the laptop and images would have to be duly returned to the offender and, under this amendment, the police would have to remove from their records any suggestion that the individual, who is a convicted sex offender, has access to a computer and is viewing pornography. This is despite the fact that such intelligence might be used by the police to adapt their management plans, and might even be the evidence they need to apply to a court for a sexual offences prevention order to impose prohibitions on the offender in order to protect the public from serious sexual harm.
	The provisions in the Bill provide the police with a simple but secure mechanism to ensure that seized indecent images of children and the devices that hold them can be forfeited once investigators no longer need to retain them. In addition to this, we have provided a simple and fair mechanism to allow owners and interested third parties to appeal against forfeiture. So there is a safeguard there already.
	I hope that, having heard that, the noble Viscount and the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, will think again about their amendments and will not feel the necessity to table them again at Third Reading.

Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: My Lords, I propose the insertion of a new clause whose purpose is to end penal custody for all children under the age of 18. I fear that this door may not be as wide open as it has been to some other proposals.
	We believe that those children for whom secure accommodation or custody is necessary and appropriate should be accommodated and managed in local authority secure children's homes or their nearest equivalent, because this is about children, not adults who are young. The arguments that we deploy for incarcerating people aged 18 and over are essentially and crucially different for those under 18, the legal definition of a child. This means that the child's welfare is the central issue and general childcare standards as applied by all those agencies which deal with children are paramount. Prison is simply not the appropriate professional or effective response to children who offend, where security and a quite different ethos obtains.
	Many experts on this matter, including the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, who has a wealth of experience and is on record as saying something along these lines if not in these very words, other experienced experts and a range of childcare agencies who sign up to the Children's Rights Alliance for England, believe that an age and needs-led approach to a child's offending, compliant with the ECHR and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which also addresses the causes of crime and how to stop very young people offending or reoffending, must inform provision and practice. This is tough on all concerned. Penal custody—prison—is the place for dangerous, persistently offending adults, not children; for children it is unproductive and in many cases causes further damage. Of course all offending is unacceptable, and persistent offending is particularly serious, so the system must teach all offenders to stop and how to change. It is how we deal with children, however, that must be different.
	It is well known that, compared with those who do not offend, this group of children has had a disproportionate experience of being in care, of lack of education through exclusion, of special educational needs, of significant mental health and personality problems, and of serious issues with drugs and alcohol. The challenge is huge, and the specialist provision necessary to meet it is very great.
	The penal custody supplied by YOIs or STCs cannot provide this degree of specialist provision. At great expense it does little to make society safer, since somewhere in the region of 70 per cent re-offend within two years of release. Anyone who has worked with such children, as I have, and all experts in social care, healthcare or education know that. The Government know it; the arguments have been rehearsed in this place many times. The astonishing thing is, though, that the response by politicians, Government and sentencers is to commit roughly 3,000 children to penal custody at any one time. Indeed, during 2004 8,110 young people were received into custody, of whom 4,500 were 15 and under. That last fact takes some believing; that in this country we imprisoned 4,500 damaged and difficult children of 15 and under, some as young as 12, in that year.
	Over the years I have been in many YOIs, which hold the majority of these children. I know the dedication of the work of many of the people in them, and the successes they have had with groups and individuals in their charge. The work of the Youth Justice Board in facilitating and supporting improvements has also been impressive. At the same time, though, the YJB has assessed 56 per cent of 15 year-olds and 35 per cent of 17 year-olds in YOIs as "vulnerable". YOIs are part of the prison service and are essentially geared to adults. By comparison with local authority secure children's homes, which I shall refer to as LASCHs from now on—a rather terrible acronym—the ratio of officers to prisoners in a YOI is one to 10, while in a LASCH it is two staff to three children. The scale of the institutions is up to 60 on a wing, compared with units of around eight in a LASCH. The provision is not child-centred. Training of nine weeks is not geared to the particular specialist requirements of children. Segregation is used, and the regulations on the use of force involving pain during restraint are not amended for children in YOIs. The latest Chief Inspector's report shows that one-third of children say they feel unsafe, a quarter say they have been assaulted or insulted by staff, and 2 per cent say they have been sexually assaulted. Since 1990, 29 children have actually died.
	STCs, planned by the Conservatives but in fact a creation of this Government, now cater for around 275 children, some as young as 12, and have a strong emphasis on education. I have seen some very good work by dedicated individuals in these STCs, particularly at Hassockfield since its recent changes. The Carlile inquiry, however, led by my noble friend, illustrated unacceptable use of restraint—in the course of which one child died—and of segregation and forcible strip-searching. They do not have the trained staff to deal with the difficult range of needs I have described. Contact with parents, carers and families is often minimal instead of central, and contact with localities to which they will return often non-existent; they are, after all, often miles away, and logistics do not allow for easy or regular contact. A constant theme from those working in STCs is the difficulty of creating proper resettlement plans with the relevant agencies, and children sometimes leave with no idea of what is to become of them.
	It is these latter key elements of family contact, local contacts, appropriate staff training and living in an environment which is primarily child-centred and welfare based that are lacking. These are hugely expensive places involving resources which should be ploughed into the LASCHs which are predicated on these elements and which already provide a roughly equivalent number of beds and where it is generally accepted that the best level of care is to be found. That is what matters, but STCs over the past nine years have been expanded at the expense of the LASCHs.
	It seems that we have different standards when it comes to children who offend and are in trouble as opposed to children who are troubled but have not done anything wrong. My noble friend Lord Carlile said:
	"Some of the treatment children in custody experience would in another setting be considered abusive and could trigger a child protection investigation".
	The parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights in its report on the Convention on the Rights of the Child stated:
	"There is abundant evidence that detention precipitates the loss of other fundamental rights. We have addressed only some of these rights such as the right to life, not to suffer inhuman or degrading treatment and the right to an education".
	And we know that children in prison do, indeed, lose out on such rights. But if children had painful restraint used on them—as indeed occurred 768 times in the STCs, resulting in 51 injuries in 2004-05—or if children committed suicide in a school or hospital in the community, what then would our reaction be? We would find it appalling, would we not, and demand an immediate end to the places where that could occur? Think of our own children, grandchildren or others we know. When they have done wrong or get into trouble, what do we do about it? We want them to know that wrong has been done and there must be some appropriate way of paying back or making amends. We want them to understand what is wrong and why, and what the effect of what they have done has been on the victim or victims. We want them to say sorry, to mean it and to determine not to do it again. They must understand the consequences of their actions and do whatever is within their means to make amends.
	If I am right, if this is indeed true, would we then want to send them away far from where the event took place, far from the person or people affected and incarcerate them with other children, all of whom have also offended, detached from what they have done and with a multitude of other difficulties and issues into the bargain? Would we want them to be sent to a place where they are often unsafe, where there may be violence, including by those who are in charge of them or supposed to be caring for them? Would we expect our children or any child to learn positive lessons from such an experience, or why he should not do it again, and indeed will not do it again? I think not, yet we shut our eyes and minds to this reality of what we are doing today to nearly 3,000 children. It is now our turn to make amends. I beg to move.

Baroness Howe of Idlicote: My Lords, I very much support this excellent amendment moved so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater of Butterstone. We have grown to expect that every time she rises to her feet.
	I particularly thank the Children's Rights Alliance for its excellent brief which was sent to us all. It drew together the efforts that have been made over the years to get the Government to agree to what the amendment once again asks for. This matter has been raised over an impressive number of years. The brief mentioned the comments of my noble friend Lord Ramsbotham when he was Chief Inspector of Prisons in 1997. He described some conditions in youth offender institutions as institutionalised child abuse.
	Yesterday, we debated the Statement on the Green Paper on children in care, with its many excellent ideas for compensating the disgracefully inadequate support that over many years we have failed to provide for children in care, with a disastrous detrimental effect on their life chances. Prevention is a major Government aim, which would have all our support, and compensation for children in this situation—with all those ideas and many more to come no doubt from the consultation that has now begun on the Green Paper—is an excellent beginning. However, we must be hoping to reclaim at least some of the children who we have failed so far that they have arrived in a situation where still, deplorably, we put them into custody.
	On the education side, which has been mentioned, those children are not even getting the required 15 hours, except for in one institution, and there is even a doubt about that. They are getting about half—some eight hours—of education. When we think of people trying to provide that education in the complete chaos of overcrowded prisons, we can see that the situation is clearly going to get much worse. The financial case against imprisoning children is strong, with the Audit Commission in 2004 talking about the reformed youth justice system and saying that custody is the most expensive and one of the least effective methods. Certainly, some sentences deliver better outcomes for children and are less expensive than others. The Local Government Association clearly appears to agree, saying that it is time that we explored more effective and sustainable ways of dealing with children in trouble rather than resorting to locking them up.
	We have already heard that 70 per cent of those leaving custody are reconvicted within a year, so this clearly is not working. I very much hope that the Government will listen sympathetically to this excellent opportunity to put all the aims and excellent ideas that they have for prevention into practice by preventing the obvious downward path that children are going to follow if they go into custody.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I understand the nature of the concerns raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, and echoed by the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, and the noble Lords, Lord Carlile and Lord Ramsbotham. We have debated these issues on a number of occasions and there has rarely been a sliver of paper between what we would all like to see but there have often been difficulties about how we get there.
	I turn to the need for greater parity of treatment in education, health, outside activity, planning for change, better management in moving children on, dealing with mental illness and prevention. The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and the House will know that those are all very much woven into the Government's plan for preventing young people getting into crime and then reducing the level of recidivism. They are all very much part of what we propose to do. This week, our most recent document produced by the Department for Education and Skills, Care Matters: Transforming the Lives of Children and Young People in Care, was welcomed. That document very much feeds into this debate in that it concerns the efforts that the Government are making to try to deal with the issues more effectively.
	The secure estate for children and young people, with which those of us in the House tonight are very familiar, is very diverse. It has different types of establishments adapted to the needs of different age groups and varying degrees of vulnerability. As we all know, those under the age of 18 vary from an 11 or 12 year-old who commits a most grievous offence—sometimes, regrettably, homicide—to a 17 year-old, who is bordering on adulthood. The needs of those disparate children can be starkly different.
	Young offender institutions provide for the upper part of the age range—that is, 15 to 17 year-old boys and 17 year-old girls—apart from those who are the most vulnerable. Secure training centres are predominantly for younger trainees and have a particular focus on providing education. They are able to accommodate some offenders whom local authority secure children's homes find too difficult to manage. That is a reality. We know that there are such children who cannot be safely accommodated in the secure children's home estate.
	The effect of the new clause will be to limit custodial provision for under-18s to secure children's homes. I do not really think that that is what the noble Baroness wishes. However, I understand from the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, that the amendment is really just asking us to look much more radically at how we respond.
	Secure children's homes are valuable institutions and form an important part of the secure estate. I am glad to hear noble Lords say that they have seen some good practice in some of them. However, they have limited capacity and are used primarily for the youngest offenders—precisely for those reasons. They would not be able to cope with a large influx of 16 and 17 year-olds. The Youth Justice Board contracts with local authorities for the use of 235 places in secure children's homes and the entire capacity of the secure children's homes sector is only 400 places. So, introducing 2,000 additional 16 and 17 year-olds would not be remotely practicable. Even if it were, the introduction of large numbers of older offenders would put the younger children seriously at risk. The Government have always made it clear that, where offenders are children, sending them to custody can be only a last resort.
	We believe that there is some scope for reducing the number of under-18s in custody. The Youth Justice Board has a target of reducing the population of under-18s in custody by 10 per cent. However, we are firmly persuaded that for serious or dangerous offenders, even though they may be quite young, custody has to be available to protect the public. We would be failing in our duty if we did not take the necessary steps to achieve that.
	I recognise the excellent intentions underlying this new clause, but removing under-18 places in young offender institutions and secure training centres would not be practicable, would do nothing to reduce crime, and would not help the troubled young people whom they are intended to serve. Indeed, we fear that it would endanger many of them in a wholly unacceptable way.
	There is still much that we can do. We hope that the work we are undertaking with the three alliances—although I heard the comments made earlier by the right reverend Prelate, Peter Selby, on those matters—will greatly help young people. The increased planning and the ability to use the resources of the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills, in a way which we could not do before, is incredibly important. Our ability to work harder with schools, other institutions and local communities to make alternatives to imprisonment a reality which is seductive to the courts—because they work—is also a challenge. There is much for us to do.
	One of the tragedies that we now face—and I sincerely believe that it is a tragedy—is the increasing number of our young people of a relatively tender age who are committing some pretty heinous offences. Some of them are big, some of them are bad and some of them are dangerous. We can debate how they got there, but the reality is that we have to deal with them as they are and not as we would like them to be. I very much agree with thrust and intention of the amendment. However, I regret to say that although the door is not closed to improvements to children, it is closed to this amendment.

Viscount Bridgeman: My Lords, in Committee we did not have time to address this amendment, which stands in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Anelay. It addresses a specific aspect that is very much complementary to the problems of children which were so eloquently debated by noble Lords in the previous group.
	The Explanatory Notes inform us that Clause 46 enables the remit of the Independent Police Complaints Commission to be expanded to provide oversight of certain personnel in the Immigration and Nationality Directorate exercising specified enforcement functions. The IPCC was established under Part 2 of the Police Reform Act 2002. Clause 46(1) of the Bill gives the Secretary of State the power to make regulations by negative procedure, conferring functions on the IPCC in relation to the exercise of specified enforcement functions by immigration officers and the exercise by officials of the Secretary of State of specified enforcement functions relating to immigration and asylum.
	The amendment inserts a new subsection to ensure that these regulatory powers may confer functions on the IPCC to set up a procedure to enable children and young people to register complaints with regard to these immigration and asylum enforcement functions. The All-Party Parliamentary Group for Children, in its child impact statement on the Bill, highlighted that the IPCC has already recognised the special needs of children and young people who wish to make complaints about the police. It argues that the IPCC needs to do the same for immigration and asylum-seeking children and young people.
	The "No Place for a Child" campaign argues that the Government currently detain more than 2,000 children, including babies, in immigration detention centres every year. That is equivalent to the number of pupils at, say, a large inner-city secondary school. A coalition of children's NGOs are concerned that, despite the estimated number of children involved, there is a distinct lack of awareness of children's issues—or, as one put it, a lack of child centeredness—in the asylum and immigration process. The Refugee Children's Consortium in particular believes that,
	"current safeguards are insufficient to protect them, especially in light of the fact that the government resisted any statutory requirement on immigration authorities to have regard to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of children during the passage of the Asylum and Nationality Act 2006".
	It goes on to state that,
	"in this context the importance of easily accessible and accountable complaints processes is considerably heightened".
	Will the Minister tell the House what training IPCC officers currently receive on children's issues—or indeed asylum and immigration officers, particularly contract workers enabled by the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Bill?
	I am sure that the Minister is fully aware of Professor Al Aynsley-Green, the Children's Commissioner for England, and his report on his visit to Yarl's Wood in October 2005. The inspection report raised a number of points, including the fact that none of the young people spoken to were aware of why they were being detained or how long they might be there. Nor did they seem to have access to any complaints procedures.
	My noble friends Lady Morris and Lady Buscombe had debates before the Summer Recess on the voice of the child in the childcare and education Bills. Many speakers to the previous amendment referred to the same problem. There can be no doubt that listening to children's views can enhance and help our understanding of the process and impacts on those experiencing it. We on these Benches wholeheartedly agree that there is a fine balance between consulting children and burdening them with decisions beyond their years. Facilitating the creation of a targeted procedure by which children and young people can register concerns and complaints will not only lead to potential improvement in the service but also help children to feel that they are being listened to and have some way of getting across their views, and that they are not isolated in this regard. I beg to move.

Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I have listened with care to the contributions made by the noble Viscount and the noble Baroness on this issue. I entirely understand their approach, and, personally, have some sympathy with it. Anybody who has ever had or worked with children could not fail to care in the impassioned way that they have demonstrated.
	Regulations made under Clause 46 would enable the Independent Police Complaints Commission to investigate complaints about, and conduct arising from, immigration enforcement activities in England and Wales. Any such complaints will be investigated thoroughly. The particular circumstances of the individuals concerned in each case, including age and vulnerability, will be taken into account and sensitively handled.
	Clause 46 will ensure that there is similar independent scrutiny of immigration officers and officials exercising police-like powers within the community, as are in place for the police themselves. Under the current legislation giving the IPCC oversight of the police, there is no separate legislative provision enabling children to register complaints with the commission as has been suggested in the proposed amendment. We take the view that such a provision is unnecessary. Procedures already exist within the commission which are sufficient for children and young people who may wish to make a complaint regarding the police. It is anticipated that the same procedures will be put in place for children who wish to make a complaint in connection with immigration enforcement.
	The commission's current statutory guidance states that where a young person under the age of 16 wishes to make a complaint, the commission encourages the police to have regard to the principle in the Gillick competency guidelines that children under the age of 16 years are able, under common law, to give valid consent provided that they have sufficient understanding and intelligence to enable them fully to understand what is involved.
	Applying that to the complaints system means that as long as a child under 16 understands fully what is involved in making a complaint, they should be able to do so. However, the police service and the commission have a responsibility to ensure that a young person making a complaint understands the process and potential outcomes and, where necessary, is provided with appropriate support in making the complaint. A complaint can be made on behalf of a child or a young person by a parent, guardian or third person.
	At regional level, the commission's central England office is focusing on increasing access to the complaints system for young people as a priority for 2006 and 2007. This will enable better understanding of the position with regard to young people and the police complaints system with a view to increasing awareness, trust and confidence, as well as access to the police complaints system.
	The work will involve: analysing complaints data on young people to ascertain their demographics and the type of complaints; identifying what the barriers are to complaining; and identifying proactive steps that can be taken to overcome those barriers and assessing them in terms of their feasibility. Examining police force data in relation to complaints that the commission deals with from young people will also be part of that work.
	A number of stakeholder meetings have already taken place. That forms part of the commission's guardianship role, concerned with the promotion of public confidence in the complaints system—including, I may add, improving and ensuring accessibility. Through that role the commission can ensure that the system is accessible to children. In addition, the Immigration and Nationality Directorate recognises the importance of providing information to children subject to immigration control and is discussing with the Children's Commissioner for England how best this can be achieved.
	I hope that what I have said has offered a measure of reassurance to the noble Viscount and the noble Baroness that their concerns are being addressed. The noble Viscount asked a particular question about IPCC staff and training issues. I cannot provide him with an answer this evening. However, I undertake to write to him and the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, on the issue. I quite understand its import and recognise that it is sensible that we get training programmes right and much more sensitised to the issues raised.
	It is perhaps worth saying that during the development of the commission's statutory guidance for the police service in England and Wales, which the Home Secretary approved and the police service must follow, which took effect from December last year, the IPCC met a range of children's organisations, including the Children's Legal Centre—based at the University of Essex—Barnardo's and the Children's Society to consult on specific issues concerning children and young people's access to the police complaints system. The commission is committed to continuing work with the police and young people's organisations on the issue in future. It is our anxious anticipation that the same approach will be followed and adopted when the commission is responsible for the oversight of immigration enforcement as well. We have found our contact with those organisations to be especially beneficial in framing the Government's approach.
	So we have some agreement—or comity, if you wish—on the issue. We are extremely happy to ensure that the active dialogue that I have described continues so that we ensure that young people can access and understand the complaints process and feel included in it, even though, as most of would willingly concede, the processes and procedures can appear somewhat complex and disconcerting at the outset. We want to ensure that we get this right, and we are grateful for the help and support that we have. I express my gratitude to the noble Viscount and the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, for their interest and concern, but I trust that, having heard my remarks, the noble Viscount will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

Viscount Bridgeman: My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for his reassurance that the Government are addressing the problems of children and young people making complaints in the immigration and asylum system. I am also grateful for his undertaking to write to me about training. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: Amendments Nos. 138 and 155 refer to foreign national prisoners and repatriation. Although it is quite late, the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, has several issues that she very much wants to have clarified, and it is therefore right for me to spend a little more time than I would otherwise spend at this late hour to ensure that those issues are covered and that we can have a proper debate.
	Foreign national prisoners currently make up approximately 12 per cent of the prisoner population. The Government believe that they should, wherever possible, serve their sentence in their own country. At present, the Repatriation of Prisoners Act 1984 requires three-way consent involving the sentencing state, the receiving state and the prisoner. That means that a prisoner can in effect veto a transfer properly agreed between the two Governments concerned by refusing to consent to the transfer, and the Government believe that this is no longer appropriate.
	The new clause amends the Repatriation of Prisoners Act by clarifying the circumstances in which a prisoner will be required to consent to a transfer before that transfer can take place. A prisoner will be required to consent to the transfer only if the relevant international agreement makes consent a prerequisite to the transfer. Amending the 1984 Act in this way will enable the United Kingdom to ratify and conclude prisoner transfer arrangements that do not require prisoner consent. The consent of both Governments involved will still be required in each case, so where prisoner consent is still required by the relevant international arrangement, Ministers must be satisfied that that consent has been given in accordance with the requirements of those arrangements before transfer can take place.
	The noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, has tabled an amendment that seeks to replace "satisfied" with,
	"has reasonable grounds for believing".
	The amendment would enable the Government to transfer a prisoner without having established beyond doubt that the prisoner had given consent in a case where the international arrangements require it to be given. We respectfully suggest that repatriating a prisoner in such circumstances without knowing for certain whether the requirement for consent had been satisfied would be inconsistent with those arrangements. Accordingly, I cannot commend the noble Baroness's amendment to the House, but I am sure that she will say in the usual way that she was simply giving me an opportunity to make it clear that such iniquitous practice would not happen here, and I am happy to oblige her.
	The Repatriation of Prisoners Act came into force about 21 years ago. Since then, the international thinking and practice on prisoner transfer has moved on. Arrangements such as the additional protocol to the Council of Europe convention on the transfer of sentenced persons opened for signature in 1997, and provide for the transfer of prisoners without their consent where they are to be deported or otherwise removed at the end of their sentence.
	The EU is also considering a proposal for a framework decision on prisoner transfer between member states, which would enable prisoners to be transferred without consent if that framework decision were to be adopted in due course. This amendment will enable the United Kingdom to start negotiations with like-minded countries to put in place prisoner transfer agreements that do not require prisoner consent. The Government will also enter into discussions with those countries with which they already have an agreement with a view to removing the requirement for consent. Their intention would be to transfer those prisoners who have no links with the United Kingdom and those who, in any event, may face deportation at the end of the sentence. Often prisoners, such as drug offenders, will have entered the United Kingdom solely to commit a criminal offence. In those circumstances, the Government believe that it is right that the prisoner should serve his sentence in his own country where he can also receive support from family, friends and the community, aiding his chances of rehabilitation. Subject to the agreement of the Government of the receiving state, prisoners will be returned to their state of nationality or, if appropriate, to the state of residence. The Government will not seek to transfer those prisoners whose primary links are agreed to be with the United Kingdom and who are therefore unlikely to be removed at the end of the sentence, although each case will be considered on its individual merits.
	Those comments deal with the generality of the noble Baroness's concerns, but she asked some additional, specific questions in relation, for example, to how many transfers per year the Government are expecting. It is not possible to estimate the number of prisoners who may be transferred without consent. That will depend on our ability to negotiate new and revised prisoner transfer agreements. The provision is part of a package of proposals aimed at increasing the number of foreign national prisoners who return to their own country to continue serving their sentence.
	The noble Baroness wants to know where some of those prisoners come from and, in particular, whether Jamaicans form the largest group in the United Kingdom, which they do. Negotiations on the prisoner transfer agreement between the United Kingdom and Jamaica are now at an advanced stage. I have the happy task of involving myself in those negotiations and we await their outcome. The noble Baroness is also interested to know whether the Government expect to make any savings on the expenditure of maintaining prisoners within the prison estate in the United Kingdom. Removing prisoners at an early stage of their sentence will free up prison places. That is important at a time when the Prison Service is facing considerable pressure on its accommodation.
	The extent of savings in prison places is of course similarly difficult to estimate. The savings will be dependent, once again, on the agreements that the Government are able to put in place and the stage in the sentence when a prisoner is transferred. This is not a scheme in the normal understanding of the word because it does not introduce any freestanding power to remove prisoners without first obtaining their consent. The amendment simply clarifies the domestic law provision on whether in future prison consent is required before a transfer can take place. As I tried to explain earlier, the option of negotiating agreements with other states without this as a provision is not available to us.
	We were also asked how we would know whether foreign prisoners qualified for transfer. The recorded nationality of a prisoner is self-declared, but work is in hand to improve the quality of the data. Once an international agreement without consent is in place, prison governors will be asked to identify all those within their custody from the countries concerned. I say in passing, since it is late at night, that if the noble Baroness's party opposite was more amenable to identity cards and their effect, we would be greatly assisted in identifying exactly who people are, where they come from and, obviously, where they could happily go back to. That is a matter on which the noble Baroness may want to reflect with her colleagues opposite. I have tried to deal with sending prisoners home, which could of course be to their country of nationality or where they have a right to reside.
	I was asked about the impact of the European free movement law upon this proposal. A prisoner's rights under the European Free Movement Directive are not affected by these changes. The Government will seek to transfer those prisoners who have no links with the United Kingdom and those who would in any case be deported at the end of their sentence. Those who have a right to reside in the United Kingdom are unlikely to be transferred unless, of course, they have lost or would otherwise lose the right of residence.
	The noble Baroness also wanted to know whether the process would be hampered by the prisoner's right to appeal or human rights and asylum legislation. The amendment will not have any effect on the obligation of the United Kingdom Government to comply with their international obligations. Consequently, prisoners affected by a decision to repatriate without consent will be able to seek judicial review of the decision if implementing it would risk infringing the ECHR, the refugee convention or another tenet of international or public law. The Government will robustly defend any decision properly taken.
	I was asked whether prisoners detained under mental health legislation would be excluded from the process, and if so, how. A decision has not yet been made on that. To be eligible for transfer, the relevant international arrangement would need to specifically cover those detained under mental health legislation. This is an enabling provision which will be effected in the way I have described.
	The noble Baroness asked whether prisoners who had previously been granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK but who were removed under this process would be able to return the UK once they had completed their sentence overseas, and if not, why not. In those circumstances, if prisoners had not already lost their indefinite leave to remain by reason of their criminality, we would not be looking to transfer them. If leave had been removed, they would not be able to return and would be on the warnings index. So it depends on the decision we make about that.
	The last question—the noble Baroness will tell me if I have not covered any of them—was how the new scheme would impact on those subject to the early release scheme. The amendment has no impact on the removal of foreign national prisoners under the early removal scheme. If a prisoner is transferred under a prisoner transfer agreement, the United Kingdom release arrangements cease to apply on transfer. If a prisoner remains in England and Wales at the point in a sentence at which he becomes eligible for early removal, then he will be considered for removal under the scheme in the normal way.
	I believe that I have dealt with all the questions and the noble Baroness will be delighted to know that if she has any further questions I will be happy to deal with them now or to write to her and place a copy in the Library. I hope that I have dealt with the questions that were likely to excite the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, too. I beg to move.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: moved Amendments Nos. 146 to 152:
	Page 168, line 31, column 2, leave out "Section 5."
	Page 168, line 38, column 2, leave out "and (4)"
	Page 168, line 39, column 2, leave out "2, 2A,"
	Page 168, line 41, at end insert-
	
		
			 "Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996(c. 25) Section 21A(4)(a)(i)." 
		
	
	Page 168, line 46, column 2, leave out "103,"
	Page 169, line 13, column 2, at end insert-
	
		
			  "In section 96, the words "of England, Wales and Northern Ireland"." 
		
	
	Page 169, line 22, column 2, leave out "371" and insert "373"
	On Question, amendments agreed to.
	Clause 57 [Extent]: